In re: Zola Fel in Pavis: City on the Edge of Forever

[svensson]

I've been greatly enjoying the two installments of @Ian A. Thomson's Pavis 1619 series. There's a lot of interesting, quirky, and fun ideas in it that will probably become part of MGU.

I have a question about it though.... I LIKE the shamanistic turn that the Zola Fel cult takes in the books but I'm wondering if the Cleansed One subcult is going to be addressed or was it purposely avoided? You have to admit that a subcult that can purge the Chaos taint from a worshiper would be a Pretty Big Freaking Deal [tm].

Insofar as I know, this is the ONLY ritual/HeroQuest/whatever can actually remove the Chaos Rune from someone's being, from their Form. The only other ritual that I know of that has similar power to so drastically alter a being's very nature is the Uz Adoption Rite of Kyger Litor.

Edited March 22 by svensson

[DrGoth]

15 minutes ago, svensson said:

I've been greatly enjoying the two installments of @Ian A. Thomson's Pavis 1619 series. There's a lot of interesting, quirky, and fun ideas in it that will probably become part of MGU.

I have a question about it though.... I LIKE the shamanistic turn that the Zola Fel cult takes in the books but I'm wondering if the Cleansed One subcult is going to be addressed or was it purposely avoided? You have to admit that a subcult that can purge the Chaos taint from a worshiper would be a Pretty Big Freaking Deal [tm].

Insofar as I know, this is the ONLY ritual/HeroQuest/whatever can actually remove the Chaos Rune from someone's being, from their Form. The only other ritual that I know of that has similar power to so drastically alter a being's very nature is the Uz Adoption Rite of Kyger Litor.

Well, Alter Creature is a pretty drastic alteration, but nothing like removing a Chaos taint. It's also deeply bound up with the Praxian myths.

[svensson]

50 minutes ago, DrGoth said:

Well, Alter Creature is a pretty drastic alteration, but nothing like removing a Chaos taint. It's also deeply bound up with the Praxian myths.

Well, I know that a beast raised to sentience by Alter Creature keeps their Beast Rune as their Form. I'd have to re-read the spell definition to find out what other Runes they might acquire and if those runes are influenced by the caster of the Alter Creature. For example, if a Lunar with a primary Moon Rune casts the spell, does the beast also gain the Moon Rune as well?

And another curve ball is herd-men. They keep their Man Rune, obviously, but what others might they affiliate with if given intelligence? Earth maybe?

My main point here is that no other magical procedures other than Cleansed One and KL Adoption Rite actually change a being FORM rune... the very basic nature of a being's concept of self. KL Adoptees certainly keep their Man Rune, but they see themselves as racially Uz forever afterwards. Alter Creature raises INT and CHA to sentient levels, but the recipient still maintains their basic Runic Form. But the 'Cleansed One ritual' can remove the Chaos Rune from a BROO.

Now, I would suppose that such a broo would remain in the shape of a broo, but all Chaos advantages would be removed. They would probably remain a hermaphrodite [such people are wholly natural, after all]. But the broo's concept of itself as a being in Glorantha would be changed on a basic level.

Edited March 22 by svensson

[PhilHibbs]

Chaos is technically a Form Rune... but is it really like the other forms? It doesn't inherently change your shape or makeup, although it can, if you get a chaos feature.

I think it has traces of all the rune types. It's also listed as a Condition Rune in the Codex Ivesti. It's a Form, because it can change your body pattern. It's a Power, because it opposes Law. It's an Element, because it can create substance, and people talk about "raw chaos" as a thing.

[soltakss]

6 hours ago, svensson said:

I LIKE the shamanistic turn that the Zola Fel cult takes in the books but I'm wondering if the Cleansed One subcult is going to be addressed or was it purposely avoided?

The Cleansed One subcult cannot purge a Chaos taint, but it teaches a difficult and dangerous HeroQuest that ends up with the Chaos taint removed. All you have to do is to swim naked along the whole river, avoiding the obstacles, monsters, Storm Bulls, Orlanthi, Yelmalians and other people hell-bent on stopping you, then you have to find another Chaos Creature, make it see itself as disgusting, then face the Guardian of the Seas and, finally, swim in the acidic salt sea as it burns the taint out of you. If you can survive that and regrow your skin then you are free of Chaos.

[hipsterinspace]

5 hours ago, svensson said:

And another curve ball is herd-men. They keep their Man Rune, obviously, but what others might they affiliate with if given intelligence? Earth maybe?

My understanding is that the thing that makes herd men what they are is that they lack the man rune. They are beasts, and if alter creature is cast on a normal human of another tribe—as the Morokanth are said to do—it turns them into a herd man by effectively taking away their man rune. If given the man rune and brought to sentience I would imagine most herd men would possess a runic affinity with Darkness, the affinity the Morokanth have and the herd men would have had in the event of their triumph over the Morokanth. 

6 hours ago, svensson said:

Insofar as I know, this is the ONLY ritual/HeroQuest/whatever can actually remove the Chaos Rune from someone's being, from their Form. The only other ritual that I know of that has similar power to so drastically alter a being's very nature is the Uz Adoption Rite of Kyger Litor.

There is a post from Greg’s archive on Well of Daliath that strikes me as important here. He made the point that chaos taint is a wound in your soul, and that the problem with getting rid of it is that it’s already an absence, a void. The big challenge in the whole process of getting rid of it is that it has to be replaced with something else, a very difficult prospect. Magasta filled the void left in the world by the implosion of The Spike, I suppose in the same way he may have also used that ancient and powerful aspect of water to fill the void in the Cleansed One’s soul.

A possibly more dramatic transformation than the Kyger Litor rite is the Aldrya rite that turns you into an elf. Kyger Litor is still a man rune deity, the Aldrya rite takes away your beast rune and replaces it with plant.

[Qizilbashwoman]

27 minutes ago, hipsterinspace said:

My understanding is that the thing that makes herd men what they are is that they lack the man rune.

i always thought the most dangerous sort of Broo is the Mallian witch born from herd men. They pass as human, are outcaste for being female, and thus are likely to be an actual "third column" threat for settled places in Prax (imagine the cursed Oases; imagine a Mallian in Pavis).

[svensson]

5 hours ago, soltakss said:

The Cleansed One subcult cannot purge a Chaos taint, but it teaches a difficult and dangerous HeroQuest that ends up with the Chaos taint removed. All you have to do is to swim naked along the whole river, avoiding the obstacles, monsters, Storm Bulls, Orlanthi, Yelmalians and other people hell-bent on stopping you, then you have to find another Chaos Creature, make it see itself as disgusting, then face the Guardian of the Seas and, finally, swim in the acidic salt sea as it burns the taint out of you. If you can survive that and regrow your skin then you are free of Chaos.

Do you have a source for that, Sol? I'd be interested in reading that.

[svensson]

5 hours ago, Qizilbashwoman said:

i always thought the most dangerous sort of Broo is the Mallian witch born from herd men. They pass as human, are outcaste for being female, and thus are likely to be an actual "third column" threat for settled places in Prax (imagine the cursed Oases; imagine a Mallian in Pavis).

I have absolutely no doubt that there are Chaos cultists, including Mallians, in New Pavis. I don't see them as a large group or organized enough to be of much harm, but they are present. With a charismatic and intelligent leader, they could really cause a lot of damage, what with the Lunar suppression of Urox/Storm Bull, but such a leader does not seem to have arisen yet.

[svensson]

@hipsterinspace Thanks for the link. That makes for interesting reading. The Q&A supports my contention that cleansing a being of Chaos is hugely difficult because it changes their basic nature at the most primal and basic levels. Though not entirely the way I originally conceived it.

[soltakss]

21 minutes ago, svensson said:

Do you have a source for that, Sol? I'd be interested in reading that.

My own HeroQuest 

[svensson]

1 hour ago, soltakss said:

My own HeroQuest 

Well, as freeform HQ's go, that's actually a really good one, one of the better one's I've read come to think of it. It deals with God-Time myths, the 'Stafford-logic' of Glorantha, the malleability of Water as an element.... Yeah, that was good work.

[Ian A. Thomson]

16 hours ago, svensson said:

I have a question about it though.... I LIKE the shamanistic turn that the Zola Fel cult takes in the books but I'm wondering if the Cleansed One subcult is going to be addressed or was it purposely avoided? You have to admit that a subcult that can purge the Chaos taint from a worshiper would be a Pretty Big Freaking Deal [tm].

Without giving away too much, this is pivotal to the ZF cult's allegiances later on, but the information only exists in brief note form at present. Advanced information on several main cults will be drop-fed later in the series

[Shiningbrow]

Maybe Arachne Solara has a way to remove the taint?

[svensson]

14 hours ago, Shiningbrow said:

Maybe Arachne Solara has a way to remove the taint?

Interesting idea.

Maybe, but if so that hasn't been revealed to us yet.

But then, everybody's Glorantha is different than everybody else's.

Edited March 25 by svensson

[Joerg]

16 hours ago, Shiningbrow said:

Maybe Arachne Solara has a way to remove the taint?

Getting eaten by her seems to do the trick - the Web of Arachne Solara doesn't seem to detect as Chaotic.