Dumping Argrath

[PhilHibbs]

19 minutes ago, Rodney Dangerduck said:

Maybe this belongs in the "Your Wackiest Idea" thread...

The word is "dumbest". And that's not an insult. Embrace the dumb, the dumb is the way.

[Martin Dick]

5 hours ago, Eff said:

since I didn't spell out that there's only one side to pick.

I really hope that in the Great Argrath Campaign, there's a chapter on choosing the Lunar's side. I think there's a great campaign to be played based on desperately defending the Empire from its many threats while simultaneously saving the soul of the Empire and not becoming the Monster Empire with Jar-Eel or the Red Emperor or Great Sister in the position of Argrath.

[Rodney Dangerduck]

1 hour ago, Martin Dick said:

I really hope that in the Great Argrath Campaign, there's a chapter on choosing the Lunar's side.

I'd like that too.  Based on the fundamental assumptions and comments here by Jeff and others about Argrath being central to RQG, that seems unlikely.

Hopefully @Nick Brooke or MOB or "fans like us" will come up with something in a supplement...

[Nick Brooke]

I strongly believe in giving the fans what they want (see the cover art for Black Spear, and note that my forthcoming scenario Crimson King continues this tradition). When canon gets too constrictive, life finds a way. YGWV.

(Anyone interested in a sane and reasonable RuneQuest campaign where the Lunars might not be such terrible baddies after all should check out Harald Smith @jajagappa's Edge of Empire, available now from the Jonstown Compendium)

[RHW]

10 hours ago, Nick Brooke said:

a sane and reasonable RuneQuest campaign

I've read these words several times, but I still can't make any sense of them.

[EMH]

On 12/30/2022 at 3:46 AM, Rodney Dangerduck said:

Winston Churchill isn't noted for his tactical successes.  Elizabeth I couldn't fight a lick.

But they both had CHA 21 and Orate 110%. That counts for a lot.

[Ian Absentia]

On 12/31/2022 at 6:56 AM, Summersong said:

See, this is an approach I never got. Not everything, everywhere, has to be about you, all the time. [...snip...] ...it's a big world, full of people.

I don't mean to suggest that the players' characters must be the focal and pivotal heroes of the setting.  And in earlier editions of RQ it was fairly clear that they weren't expected to be.  But in this edition they are made party to that level of power.  Sure, it's a big world and there are lots of stories to tell, but deferring to Argrath by default shouldn't be preordained.

In the last RQG campaign I played, I voiced my ambition to eventually track down and defeat Harrek, and maybe even raise a Golden Moon.  The GM and his friends laughed and told me that it wouldn't happen, couldn't happen.  Yeah, it would be a big swing, but being told that it conflicted impossibly with the metaplot was a total ****-block.

That's what I mean when I say that Argrath occupies a position that the players ought to have, or at least have open to them.  I realise that it's not currently fashionable to reassure everyone that YGWV, but, yeah, it will, and it should be encouraged.

!i!

Edited January 2, 2023 by Ian Absentia

[Rodney Dangerduck]

1 hour ago, EMH said:

But they both had CHA 21 and Orate 110%. That counts for a lot.

Churchill was more like 200%.  Though I agree completely, that skills other than tactical prowess and sword are important to a leader.

[Erol of Backford]

Any great leader has a support team, the PC's could be that...

[Martin Dick]

8 hours ago, Ian Absentia said:

I realise that it's not currently fashionable to reassure everyone that YGWV, but, yeah, it will, and it should be encouraged.

I really don't get what you mean here, multiple Chaosium staff have commented that canon only matters for Chaosium products, it doesn't matter for our campaigns and it doesn't matter for the Jonstown Compendium. To be honest (even if it is an important message), YGWV gets said so many times that it gets monotonous. What sort of encouragement are you envisaging?

[Summersong]

9 hours ago, Ian Absentia said:

...  But in this edition they are made party to that level of power.  ....

 

Seriously? Starting characters in RQG are competent at some of the skills of their profession but that's a huge gap between that, and being a Hero.

[Eff]

4 hours ago, Martin Dick said:

I really don't get what you mean here, multiple Chaosium staff have commented that canon only matters for Chaosium products, it doesn't matter for our campaigns and it doesn't matter for the Jonstown Compendium. To be honest (even if it is an important message), YGWV gets said so many times that it gets monotonous. What sort of encouragement are you envisaging?

Honestly, Your Glorantha Will Vary has always been an incomplete or inadequate expression, because Glorantha has always been incomplete, for a long time deliberately so. It's not only going to vary, whenever you play with Glorantha, you, the players, must fill in gaps and complete the areas of personal interest. 

This is unlikely to actually be adopted, because there's a strong desire to know more of the lore baked into the fanbase that these games are primarily if not entirely made for. The distinction between Runequest 2's presentation of Glorantha as an example fantasy world you can create using its rules, and Runequest: Roleplaying in Glorantha's, well, just look at the title, is valuable there. 

3 hours ago, Summersong said:

Seriously? Starting characters in RQG are competent at some of the skills of their profession but that's a huge gap between that, and being a Hero.

A starting character in RQ2 does not start the game in a context where Argrath, Jaldon, Jar-Eel, Cragspider, Ethilrist, or Androgeus is relevant to their personal lives. They don't even start in a context where Flash-Jak would be relevant! These characters can be made relevant to the initial situation, but it isn't baked in. 

An RQG starting character does start with Argrath, or the FHQ, or the Red Emperor, being relevant to their personal lives through the character creation system. By default, these characters are baked in to whatever comes next. 

[jajagappa]

On 1/1/2023 at 2:54 AM, Nick Brooke said:

(Anyone interested in a sane and reasonable RuneQuest campaign where the Lunars might not be such terrible baddies after all should check out Harald Smith @jajagappa's Edge of Empire, available now from the Jonstown Compendium)

13 hours ago, Ian Absentia said:

Sure, it's a big world and there are lots of stories to tell, but deferring to Argrath by default shouldn't be preordained.

One of the things I like about the Lunar southern provinces is that they fall into this more ambiguous zone between Argrath and the Lunar Heartlands.  The Lunars aren't all bad guys, and as the Hero Wars get underway, there's a lot of Player agency/decision about whether to ally with Argrath (help fight monsters from Tork, or Dorastor, or aid Queen Inrana in Saird), or to call upon the Red Emperor/Jar-eel (help drive back the barbarian horde), or perhaps even join forces with the horse nomads (free Sheng from the Underworld)!  Or there is the possibility to try to navigate some middle ground (e.g. broker a deal with the dwarfs and become arms dealer to both sides), which might include calling upon Androgeus or establishing your own hero as a broker between parties.  

[Squaredeal Sten]

⁶.....

1 hour ago, Eff said:

......

An RQG starting character does start with Argrath, or the FHQ, or the Red Emperor, being relevant to their personal lives through the character creation system. By default, these characters are baked in to whatever comes next. 

Not if the players and GM want to distance themselves from those meta plot characters.   Yes if you pick up RQiG and generate a character some of the traumatic events in the family history will be relevant.  Note, however, these events  are not forced into game play.  They are prologue.

But it was a choice in my Zoom campaign to use Six Seasons (therefore NOT to start on the generic RQiG date) , in which the Adventurers meet and get to know some of the meta charcters and participate in meta plot events.   That's very popular and a lot of fun.  

But starting in 1625-26 by the book doesn't involve us so personally with the meta characters.  We are on the edge and not being railroaded into  meeting them.  The Starter Set starts us just after Dangerford, no need to run into  Argrath or Jar Eel.  

      It would be a third and equally different choice to run a merchant caravan based campaign in which the Adventurers try to work around the meta plot events and are trading into Caladraland or the Eastern Isles when the Dragon rises or when Argrath moves north.  In this case Argrath and company can just be distant background.  And it is still RQiG. 

 

Edited January 2, 2023 by Squaredeal Sten
Spelling / typing

[PhilHibbs]

17 hours ago, Ian Absentia said:

... in earlier editions of RQ it was fairly clear that they weren't expected to be.  But in this edition they are made party to that level of power.

7 hours ago, Summersong said:

Seriously? Starting characters in RQG are competent at some of the skills of their profession but that's a huge gap between that, and being a Hero.

Agreed, "not yet". As to whether we will see official RQ rules that can take adventurers up to Argrath or Harrek level of power, I don't know. Jeff has teased some rules in The White Bull campaign, but that's just the first baby steps on that road, and I heard a rumour that those rules ("here's a new Rune Pool to spend POW on, and some new spells") have been substantially changed anyway.

[Ian Absentia]

27 minutes ago, PhilHibbs said:

Agreed, "not yet". 

Let me put it this way.  Aside from my days of playing HQ, I've never before had a starting RuneQuest character capable of being lifted by the winds of Orlanth and shining with the light of Yelmalio deliver a crushing spear-thrust with a modified to-hit upwards of 150%.  It was a path that promised Bigger Things to Come.  Which I've gathered is the intent of the design.

Metaplot is fun to read, but don't let it shut down my party.

!i!

[DucksMustDie]

On 1/1/2023 at 9:54 AM, Nick Brooke said:

Black Spear

Well, the Black Spear gave me the idea. Argrath the Junkie --> Argrath the Dude 

[Eff]

4 hours ago, Squaredeal Sten said:

⁶.....

Not if the players and GM want to distance themselves from those meta plot characters.   Yes if you pick up RQiG and generate a character some of the traumatic events in the family history will be relevant.  Note, however, these events  are not forced into game play.  They are prologue.

But it was a choice in my Zoom campaign to use Six Seasons (therefore NOT to start on the generic RQiG date) , in which the Adventurers meet and get to know some of the meta charcters and participate in meta plot events.   That's very popular and a lot of fun.  

But starting in 1625-26 by the book doesn't involve us so personally with the meta characters.  We are on the edge and not being railroaded into  meeting them.  The Starter Set starts us just after Dangerford, no need to run into  Argrath or Jar Eel.  

      It would be a third and equally different choice to run a merchant caravan based campaign in which the Adventurers try to work around the meta plot events and are trading into Caladraland or the Eastern Isles when the Dragon rises or when Argrath moves north.  In this case Argrath and company can just be distant background.  And it is still RQiG. 

 

Yes, it's true that you're not forced into interacting with particular characters, because a book is incapable of forcing people to do things independently. The more relevant aspect, though, is that if you pick up the Runequest: Roleplaying in Glorantha core book and run the game from the core book, what you will do when creating characters is to start with their homelands and then move to their family history, and in that family history, there are some figures (Fazzur, the Red Emperor, Pharandros, Argrath, the Feathered Horse Queen, Samastina, and Harrek) who you can, and quite frankly are likely to gain Loyalty Passions for.

So when the GM goes to consider plot points to introduce, these are names which have been marked as clearly relevant for player characters as people they did or may have interacted with in the past. If the group decides to use the shorter family history options, they have to invent three Passions for their characters or else they roll in the entries for 1622-1625, which is likely to highlight these characters as well because they're marked as important figures. These figures are marked as relevant and important right off the bat.

To contrast, Runequest 2 generates ties for new player characters to institutions- guilds and cults paying for training and the consequent debt load. It does not generate these ties to specific setting figures, although, for example, it's fairly likely you'll end up interacting with Argrath if you're using the Pavis box because Garrath Sharpsword is a guild instructor. But using that core book alone... it's quite likely you're not playing in Glorantha, but for the sake of argument, the things which are flagged as relevant to the characters are the guilds and cults and developing plot points (along with the firmer character motivations of RQ2- getting a Rune) is more likely to be built off of those guilds and cults because they're already there. And in RQG, the metaplot figures are also already there.

[Sheliak]

The current iteration of Argrath (one Argrath, his companions are only his instruments) is intensely boring to me. There are major NPCs that I actually like—Kallyr, Cragspider, Broyan, I'd love to know more about Inkarne. But Argrath for me is in an awkward middle ground between the interesting big-deal characters and forces of nature like Harrek and Jar-Eel. 

In general, I found the Argrath situation in King of Sartar—where he was multiple historical figures who got confused with each other, or possibly multiple members of a player party that suffered a lot of attrition—really interesting. (I also really liked Annstad of Dunstop.) And coming at it already bored by "modern" Argrath, I was surprised by how much I liked that whole situation! I'm sad that it's been abandoned. 

(My favorite Argrath is Argrath Venharlson of the Karandoli—that was a lovely numinous fairytale, if kind of disconnected from any, well, Argrathing.) 

[Nick Brooke]

7 hours ago, Sheliak said:

The current iteration of Argrath (one Argrath, his companions are only his instruments) is intensely boring to me…

I wrote the version in Black Spear because I was rather bored with the traditional modern presentation of Argrath (*swoon*). It includes an appendix giving multiple possible ‘takes’ on Argrath that you can mix and match to roll your own. Have you checked it out?

[radmonger]

21 hours ago, Eff said:

To contrast, Runequest 2 generates ties for new player characters to institutions

i have to admit the rq;g approach of personal loyalties is a lot more flavoursome for bronze age fantasy than going out working to pay back your college debts.

The problem is it is not really followed through  (yet?) in a way that supports any type of campaign other than metaplot npc as questgiver. Even Black Spear is based around that, just with more flexibility than most about what it means for the quest to succeed.

Canonically, Kallyr fails her LBQ and dies in battle shortly after the default campaign start date . if that is the point in the classic hero narrative where the mentor dies, the satisfactory follow-up is not usually 'and then I found someone else to follow'.

Argrath will have a higher sword skill than virtually any player, and some nifty magic items and hero powers. But the thing that really separates him from a starting PC is that he has hundreds to thousands of skilled and tough people with 'loyalty; Argrath' written on their character sheet.

There are no real rules to track those values, to give the gm guidance on how a given action might raise or lower it. what they need to do to maintain it, and what use it is in a battle, moot or quest. The JC product _company of the dragon_ does have rules for running a warband. But, independently of their personal heroic power, the major npcs are at least one level up from that.

The question 'how many divisions does the Moon Pope have' is one that really needs an answer if you are going to play as one of his peers.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Rodney Dangerduck]

37 minutes ago, radmonger said:

Canonically, Kallyr fails her LBQ and dies in battle shortly after the default campaign start date

I found the Kallyr - Leika rivalry very interesting to role play for our PCs.  Especially as both protagonists have great flaws to go with their many strengths.  IMO, too bad that they both "go away". 

Also, we put in considerable thought into which PCs would get Loyalty checks for Leika / Kallyr as they battled for our loyalty.  A shrewd PC could (slightly) play them off against each other.  And it brought out your PC's attitude - are they "smart and pragmatic" (Leika) or more "bold and heroic" (Kallyr)  Maybe you'd learn to respect both sides.  Fun.  And, in retrospect, a complete waste of time.

Edited January 3, 2023 by Rodney Dangerduck

[jajagappa]

2 hours ago, Rodney Dangerduck said:

A shrewd PC could (slightly) play them off against each other.  And it brought out your PC's attitude - are they "smart and pragmatic" (Leika) or more "bold and heroic" (Kallyr)  Maybe you'd learn to respect both sides.  Fun.  And, in retrospect, a complete waste of time.

But why a waste of time???  That's politics, Game of Thrones, etc.  One leader is gone, and there's a power vacuum.

You've bet on Kallyr and she's dead.  Or you got skilled playing them against each other, and one is gone.  Now what do you do?  Committed to Leika - she's there, but the other tribes are stacked against her.  She needs a new ally (in my game, she sent the PC's on a quest to gain a New Vision for the Colymar, and possibly seek out an alliance in Whitewall, if any there seem strong enough).  Turn to Argrath of Pavis?  Maybe, but Leika needs to define and carve out her role if she's going to be Kingmaker.  She needs an "in" with Argrath - something that keeps his barbarian horde from ransacking everything.  Or perhaps turn to Fazzur and his sons?  She hates Pharandros, but maybe Fazzur would join with her?  Or there's the Sun Dome Temple...  It's a whole new ball game to negotiate.

[Eff]

19 minutes ago, jajagappa said:

But why a waste of time???  That's politics, Game of Thrones, etc.  One leader is gone, and there's a power vacuum.

You've bet on Kallyr and she's dead.  Or you got skilled playing them against each other, and one is gone.  Now what do you do?  Committed to Leika - she's there, but the other tribes are stacked against her.  She needs a new ally (in my game, she sent the PC's on a quest to gain a New Vision for the Colymar, and possibly seek out an alliance in Whitewall, if any there seem strong enough).  Turn to Argrath of Pavis?  Maybe, but Leika needs to define and carve out her role if she's going to be Kingmaker.  She needs an "in" with Argrath - something that keeps his barbarian horde from ransacking everything.  Or perhaps turn to Fazzur and his sons?  She hates Pharandros, but maybe Fazzur would join with her?  Or there's the Sun Dome Temple...  It's a whole new ball game to negotiate.

I'm guessing that the reason why he perceives it as a waste of time is because the answers to the questions being raised would appear to already be answered. Between bold heroism and intellectual pragmatism, intellectual pragmatism's victory is already set in stone. (And then Leika's death is also set in stone, but a bit more remotely.) So choosing Kallyr or trying to find a middle ground- those are the wrong answers. Or perhaps there's no meaning to the events and the time was wasted because there were themes at play and symbolic language in action when those were irrelevant all along. 

And what's more, of course, is that Kallyr has been deemed to have been explicitly wrong, to have been bad at her job, to not be all that good of an Orlanthi. So even if you want to carry the flag of Kallyrist politics forward, this has already been defined as a mistake, a bad trajectory, by statements that are certainly presented as the truth about what Glorantha not only is but in many cases was apparently always meant to be. 

It's sort of like the difficulties in trying to play from the Lunar perspective while still keeping to the metaplot and statements about the metaplot- whatever the Red Moon develops into thematically throughout the course of your game, as something the characters value (or else they wouldn't be Lunars!) it is something that must inevitably be destroyed, and it's something which must be irretrievably tainted with corrosive unreality. So in this fashion, I would say that it is also a waste of time to keep to the metaplot while playing Lunars unless it's primarily to revel in how disgusted you are by the Lunars and their lunatic ways. 

Now, you can and in my opinion absolutely should ditch the metaplot when playing, and then you can ask questions that don't have predefined answers and work out what answers your characters or your group comes to. But then at that point it's a question of whether your Glorantha is varying or being run directly counter to what has been presented as the consistent, unchanging intent of Glorantha from the 1970s or 1980s, and I can't blame people for feeling like there's no point to a game which would appear to be anti-Gloranthan even, or perhaps especially if it's being conducted without any negative intent towards Glorantha. 

[JonL]

On 12/24/2022 at 8:58 PM, John Biles said:

If it has to be an NPC, then it should be a Duck.

Ponsonby bears the Sartar rune, after all.