Yelmalio Analogy for changes over the years

[Rodney Dangerduck]

I think this is a good real world analogy for what has happened to Yelmalio over the years as we move into RQG.

Yelmalio was a Jaguar E-type (from the 1960s-1970s).  Easily recognizable as a fast performance car.  It had its quirks, and it's style.  One could argue that the harder core Humakt Porsche 911 was a better performance car, but both were worthy choices for warrior adventurers.

Now, its 2022.

Porsche has added tons of horsepower (Sword Trance) and fixed one of the 911s weaknesses, the tricky rear-heavy handling (Strong Sword).  The current 911 is vastly better than the 911s of the 1960s.  It will utterly crush an E-Type on a racetrack.

The versatile Orlanth "hot hatch" rally car (e.g. Volkswagen GTI, Honda Si, Subaru WRX,...) has greatly improved.  A good everyday car with many options, and it will crush an E-Type on a racetrack.

Even the Ernalda minivan has improved a lot, and, in addition to hauling a soccer team, many minivans can compete with an original E-Type on a race track.  (Grassroots Racing tested them a decade or so ago and it was close)

However, the Yelmalio E-Type is exactly the same as the 1970s (RQ2).  Still has it's quirks.  With time, they have gotten even more noticeable.  Still has style. 

But, as a performance car for the warrior adventurer, Yelmalio is no longer recognizable as a good choice. 

Now, the powers that be are very happy with this decline in Yelmalio's relative value, so this discussion isn't going to change anything.  I've heard of campaigns where the PCs openly mock NPC Yelmalians.  I just thought it was a good analogy.  Hope somebody enjoys.

Edited November 16, 2022 by Rodney Dangerduck

[Richard S.]

Orlanth's the only god you mention whose repertoire of spells has really changed, with Adventurous getting Lighting; Humakt and Yelmalio have the same options they've had since Cults of Prax. The only major difference between then and now is the availability of Rune magic in general.

EDIT: and seemingly Yelmalio will be getting Sureshot at some point, judging by the starter set Yelmalian. And we know he's getting Shield as an associate with the cults book.

And keep in mind that not spending RP on specialty spells means you have more to spend on common spells, like wards and healing and cult spirits, which are very valuable even if not as flashy as lightings and trueswords. The other war gods might have a broader range of spells on offer, and some of them might be fairly powerful, but they have no more resources than anyone else when it comes to actually casting them. Hell, you could argue that Humakt has even less since his initiates only have one chance per season to get RP, with no associated cults.

 

Anyone keeping tally on how often this conversation's been brought up? I count at least four.

Edited November 17, 2022 by Richard S.

[Rodney Dangerduck]

40 minutes ago, Richard S. said:

Humakt and Yelmalio have the same options they've had since Cults of Prax.

In CoP, Humakt had neither Sword Trance nor Strong Sword.  (Assuming they do get Strong Sword in RQG when the Gods book comes out).  Sword Trance is truly game-changing, and Strong Sword is very good.

As for Orlanth, it gained way more than just Lightning.  Leap and Wind Warp, Thunderbolt (the best attack spell in the game).  Their Associated Cults provide many very good rune spells such as Bear's Strength, Charisma, Heal Body, and Earth Shield.  Maybe in the fuller God's book Yelmalio will gain a few good spells from his associates.

[Richard S.]

10 minutes ago, Rodney Dangerduck said:

In CoP, Humakt had neither Sword Trance nor Strong Sword.  (Assuming they do get Strong Sword in RQG when the Gods book comes out).  Sword Trance is truly game-changing, and Strong Sword is very good.

Right on both counts, my bad. I though sword trance was an RQ3 spell, whoops. 

If I can ask, though, have you had any experience with those spells in-game? How powerful spells are theoretically can be pretty different from how they actually perform in the players' hands.

18 minutes ago, Rodney Dangerduck said:

As for Orlanth, it gained way more than just Lightning.  Leap and Wind Warp, Thunderbolt (the best attack spell in the game).  Their Associated Cults provide many very good rune spells such as Bear's Strength, Charisma, Heal Body, and Earth Shield.  Maybe in the fuller God's book Yelmalio will gain a few good spells from his associates.

Wind warp and thunderbolt are from RQ3, but you're right on Leap. Most of the associates are also carried over from RQ3, though I feel those are the most flexible to change since it's fairly easy to justify new associates in game depending on where in the world you are.

Yelmalio's getting shield at least from both Orlanth and Yelm. That's a very good spell. I'm hoping priests serving under the Light Captain will get access to sunspear too, like in RQ2, so it's not high priest only. We'll see.

[Rodney Dangerduck]

29 minutes ago, Richard S. said:

If I can ask, though, have you had any experience with those spells in-game? How powerful spells are theoretically can be pretty different from how they actually perform in the players' hands.

It depends on whether the opposition has the ability to Dispel, is intelligent enough to do so, and how strictly you play the rules for targeting a spell to dispel (or dismiss).  And it depends if the GM is willing to "spoil the fun" of a Humakti PC by "picking on" their Sword Trance.  That's actually an aspect of the spell I like the least...

One thing for sure, against unintelligent creatures, especially those who attack with natural weapons, Sword Trance is all powerful.  Due to the greatly increased parry skill (over 100%), they will probably miss their attack.  Then you parry and damage their claw or bite.

I played in one game with Todd Gardiner (of Chaosium) and his poor Scorpion Men totally stopped attacking with their stingers after several had been chopped off in one round on parries.  The standard tactic of ganging up with multiple attacks on the Humakti Duck backfired completely.  The Duck did have up Truesword, some sorcery spell, and a lot of Bladesharp as well, so this was an extreme example.

[Richard S.]

42 minutes ago, Rodney Dangerduck said:

And it depends if the GM is willing to "spoil the fun" of a Humakti PC by "picking on" their Sword Trance.  That's actually an aspect of the spell I like the least...

Do you mean enforcing the "trance" part of the spell? If you don't do that then yeah of course it's horribly unbalanced, it's meant for the Humakti to be doing nothing but nonstop fighting.

[Rodney Dangerduck]

4 minutes ago, Richard S. said:

Do you mean enforcing the "trance" part of the spell? If you don't do that then yeah of course it's horribly unbalanced, it's meant for the Humakti to be doing nothing but nonstop fighting.

No.  By quickly dispelling the spell.

Or perhaps by running away,which is a very reasonable option 

[Richard S.]

Just now, Rodney Dangerduck said:

No.  By quickly dispelling the spell.

Or perhaps by running away,which is a very reasonable option 

Ah, that makes sense. I think it's reasonable to have NPCs focus on it, it's definitely something people in-universe would know of and be intimidated by. And at least the enemy will be wasting resources and/or ignoring the rest of the party.

[Eff]

2 hours ago, Rodney Dangerduck said:

No.  By quickly dispelling the spell.

Or perhaps by running away,which is a very reasonable option 

Yeah, dispelling as it exists in the game is frustrating because if it's applied "naturalistically" it breaks some of the commonest reasons for picking a particular cult- "princess play" (playing the role of a particular fictional character type for personal appeal) and wanting to play a character with a particular social role in the fictional society. So it relies on an implicit social contract that NPCs won't use it when it would be most useful for them to do so, without making any of that explicit. 

[Rodney Dangerduck]

22 minutes ago, Eff said:

So it relies on an implicit social contract that NPCs won't use it

True.  Same for NPCs not dispelling PC spells like Charisma is a social situation.

[HreshtIronBorne]

4 hours ago, Rodney Dangerduck said:

 

I played in one game with Todd Gardiner (of Chaosium) and his poor Scorpion Men totally stopped attacking with their stingers after several had been chopped off in one round on parries.  The standard tactic of ganging up with multiple attacks on the Humakti Duck backfired completely.  The Duck did have up Truesword, some sorcery spell, and a lot of Bladesharp as well, so this was an extreme example.

I played in a campaign several years long in game time, probably about a year maybe year and a half of weekly meet ups. My humakti was a MONSTER. Regularly Sword Tranced for 11mp, it happens in one round. When he needed to he would go all out and spend enough to get to 500% to hit for infinite specials. He was able to cast several combined Strength, Coordination, and Mobility through a matrix. Had at least 10 RP by the time we got to the end of the first couple years. Really prioritized getting his RP pool large enough to not worry about having only 1 re-up a season. 

We were just getting the party into Rune-Lord status when the campaign fizzled out. My Humakti would almost always go into battle with a Truesword and CM and/or Shield on the sword and Sword Trance 11 and Shield 2-4 on himself depending on the baddies. He absolutely dismantled anything not intelligent and most intelligent beings. 

The party also had a LM Philosopher that knew Boon of Kargan Tor, could do something like 3d6 for 8 weeks. Every conceivable weapon and ammo was enchanted as he had 100 and some odd MP storage, most of which regenerated. 

[HreshtIronBorne]

13 minutes ago, Rodney Dangerduck said:

True.  Same for NPCs not dispelling PC spells like Charisma is a social situation.

They just cast their own. Or Lie, or whatever else if fun. Lol.

[davecake]

The analogy fails, because Yelmalio was never an effective warrior cult 😁

In Cults of Prax, Yelmalio was the fighting cult that *decreased* your access to good combat spirit magic, as it granted only very weak combat spells (I think their most vaguely combat effective spirit magic spell was Coordination, but prevented your access to several including two of the most potentially useful to them), and only one real combat Rune spell (Sunbright), and that was still very weak unless you were fighting trolls or undead. They did have 2H Spear and Shield, which was quite effective in mass combat, but as it was not very useful in less structured melee, and was a separate skill to work up, so it actually made them a bit weaker as adventurers if anything. In short, Yelmalio the analogy was quite correct in saying that Yelmalio has not really improved since RQ2 days, but wrong in saying that Yelmalio was ever a strong choice - it was pretty weak compared to Humakt, Storm Bull, Orlanth or Seven Mothers even in Cults of Prax days (though admittedly some others, like Waha, were also fairly weak back then - and have generally somewhat improved). It has been claimed by various people connected to Chaosium that this was deliberate on Greg’s part. 

Edited November 19, 2022 by davecake

[Jose]

4 hours ago, Richard S. said:

Do you mean enforcing the "trance" part of the spell? If you don't do that then yeah of course it's horribly unbalanced, it's meant for the Humakti to be doing nothing but nonstop fighting.

2 points of spirit dispel magic or 1 point of dispel rune magic and sword trance is gone with those precious magic points the humakt used. Opponents are also smart. 

[David Scott]

7 hours ago, Rodney Dangerduck said:

Strong Sword

Where is this from?

[metcalph]

12 minutes ago, David Scott said:

Where is this from?

Think it's a thinko for True Sword.  But Humakt already had that as far as back as Cults of Prax.

[David Scott]

35 minutes ago, metcalph said:

Think it's a thinko for True Sword.  But Humakt already had that as far as back as Cults of Prax.

Found it - Strongblade - available to the personal bodyguard of the Feathered Horse Queen via the Grazelander hero cult of Hiia Swordsman. 

Edited November 17, 2022 by David Scott
hero cult not subcult

[Darius West]

9 hours ago, Rodney Dangerduck said:

However, the Yelmalio E-Type is exactly the same as the 1970s (RQ2).  Still has it's quirks.  With time, they have gotten even more noticeable.  Still has style. 

But, as a performance car for the warrior adventurer, Yelmalio is no longer recognizable as a good choice.

You aren't using the darkness rules (p224) properly.  Yelmalio is a night fighter who uses the power of light to aid visibility.  The darkness rules are punishing.  Yelmalio for this reason is still an excellent troll slater, as well as dealing with subterranean chaos better than everyone else.

I personally think that the whole idea of "Yelmalio" as a single deity is wrong.  We should have several similar variants that account for the regional differences in how the deity works.  Ostrich Yelmalio is not Far Point's Elmal, and Elmal is not Sun County's Tharkantus.  Yelmalio is really Lunar propaganda to pretend that several similar cults are the same cult and then strip it away from the Orlanthi, by uniting them in a myth of hostility to Orlanth.  It just ain't so.

If you think Yelmalio needs a rewrite, what about using regional differences to create several differing versions of Yelmalio?

Edited November 17, 2022 by Darius West

[metcalph]

9 hours ago, Rodney Dangerduck said:

But, as a performance car for the warrior adventurer, Yelmalio is no longer recognizable as a good choice. 

I don't think he was ever written up as one.  

Quote

Humakt builds warriors – the Sun Dome trains soldiers.

Cults of Prax p53

On an individual level in Cults of Prax - Yelmalio sucks compared to Humakt, Orlanth, Storm Bull, Zorak Zoran and even the Seven Mothers.  That's because being a warrior adventurer is not what Yelmalio is about - it's about stoic survival with the full knowledge that you'll never be as good as the others.  The Sun Dome's strength lies in that their stocisim makes them awesomely suited to pike, even though they have no special magic for such warfare.  And with pike in decent numbers, the other's emphasis on individual might is no longer a winning strategy.

[MOB]

17 minutes ago, metcalph said:

On an individual level in Cults of Prax - Yelmalio sucks compared to Humakt, Orlanth, Storm Bull, Zorak Zoran and even the Seven Mothers.  That's because being a warrior adventurer is not what Yelmalio is about - it's about stoic survival with the full knowledge that you'll never be as good as the others.  The Sun Dome's strength lies in that their stocisim makes them awesomely suited to pike, even though they have no special magic for such warfare.  And with pike in decent numbers, the other's emphasis on individual might is no longer a winning strategy.

Humakt cultist: "I win by winning"

Yelmalio cultists: "We win but not losing"

[Akhôrahil]

1 hour ago, MOB said:

Yelmalio cultists: "We win but not losing"

I think Yelmalio would work a lot better as a cult if its magic supported that, with spells for survivability and steadfastness (that would make the phalanx be more impressive).

(The big loss for Yelmalio in RQG was the double punch of Rune Magic becoming very available, that hurt because of how bad Rune Magic is for Yelmalio (adding Shield takes it from appalling to merely mediocre), and skills starting out massively higher (a gift for 90% in your weapon is superb if others start at 30 or 50%, but less impressive if other starting PCs have 90% skills anyway).)

Edited November 17, 2022 by Akhôrahil

[Scotty]

11 hours ago, Richard S. said:

seemingly Yelmalio will be getting Sureshot at some point, judging by the starter set Yelmalian.

No. The Starter Set is a streamlined system, see the notes on Darzim and Sureshot in the Q&A.

11 hours ago, Richard S. said:

And we know he's getting Shield as an associate with the cults book.

Yes, it's a correction for the Core Rules, see the Q&A.

10 hours ago, Richard S. said:

I'm hoping priests serving under the Light Captain will get access to sunspear too, like in RQ2, so it's not high priest only.

Quote

Yelm provides the Light Captain, the priests who follow the Light Captain, the High Priest, and the Light Keeper with his Sunspear spell.

Remember, that Minor temples have no access to associate cults, major temples have 1, and great temples all of the appropriate regional associate cults.

[Joerg]

1 hour ago, Scotty said:

Remember, that Minor temples have no access to associate cults, major temples have 1, and great temples all of the appropriate regional associate cults.

What is the procedure to receive associate magic by visiting a temple or shrine to that associate deity? Or would that open a separate initiation and rune point account?

[Akhôrahil]

14 minutes ago, Joerg said:

What is the procedure to receive associate magic by visiting a temple or shrine to that associate deity? Or would that open a separate initiation and rune point account?

This merely involves learning the spell, in much the same method as usually (POW sacrifice or pay, at a temple/shrine that teaches the spell).

Except that perhaps you will have to prove your worth to that temple first, if it's not merely about a shrine in your home temple, but this goes for in-cult magic at another temple as well.

(Also, unlike your regular cult Rune Spells, you may have Rune troubles for spells that don't match up with yours.)

Edited November 17, 2022 by Akhôrahil

[Scotty]

3 hours ago, Joerg said:

What is the procedure to receive associate magic by visiting a temple or shrine to that associate deity? Or would that open a separate initiation and rune point account?

See Gaining Access to Associated Cult Rune Spells in the Q&A.