The Great Winter

[DrGoth]

Just wondering how many people died in the great winter?  Or, to take a demographic view, what percentage of the population?

If you ran it from the 1621 event, then for a Sartarite, the chance of having a parent die is (assuming my math is working) is approximately 30%.

But that's a dumb way to work it out. Those tables are for PCs, not the whole population.  Read them as applying to the whole population and 60% of the population of Lunar Tarsh witnessed the Dragonrise. Obviously not.

So, what else do we have in the way of before and after figures?

From the GTG, map on p.173, 1621 populations

Alda-chur 4k

Clearwine, 2k

Jonstown 2k

Boldhome 11k

From various sources, 1625

Alda-chur 4k (https://wellofdaliath.chaosium.com/city-populations/)

Boldhome 11k (same ref)

Jonstown 2500 (starter back, book 2, p.27)

Clearwin 1850 (GM pack, adventure book, p.12)

We also have this note from the last reference "“The total population has recovered since the Great Winter three years ago, although the population is disproportionately made up
of young children and adults, with fewer than normal elders.”

The adults ref doesn't mean much - they lived through the Great Winter. And recovered does seem to mean that any losses have been replaced, judging by the above figures.

So, what proportion of the population died?  If you assume (for argument's sake) an average lifespan of 60 years, then 1/60th of the population is born each year - or 1.66%, for a stable population.  For new births to make up even a 5% loss in the Great Winter in three years, you're assuming a 1.66% addition per year for three years. So that would take a sustained doubling of the normal birth rate since the Great Winter. Possible, but a bit of a stretch.  I can't see it being any higher.  Which means the actual death rate may have been lower.  Of course, I'm not taking infant mortality rates into account, but even so. And I assume they are lower in Glorantha. Less infant mortality, more deaths from combat.

As an aside, the British suffered 6% of the adult male population died in WW1 (https://www.parliament.uk/business/publications/research/olympic-britain/crime-and-defence/the-fallen/). Which is somewhat less than 5% of the total population.

Thoughts?

[JRE]

The problem for these calculations is Magic, as Glorantha is not earth. The positive impact may be much higher than doubling the birth rate in the joyful years after the return of Orlanth and Ernalda, and the surge of fertility magics that come with it. Another factor, for me, is religious festivals, which mean that women without partners, but also post-menopause women and even men (though that will be rare), depending on your reading of the Pregnancy spell, may become pregnant when Fertility magic runs high.

I would also expect many youth being initiated earlier, which among the orlanthi also means becoming adults and having sex earlier, together with two year groups that were not initiated properly due to the main gods absence. 

It may well be possible that the numbers of towns remain constant as the hungry clansmen flock to them while the countryside depopulates.

The Sartarites avoided most conflict during the first two years after the return of Orlanth (1624-1626), probably because they were too weak to interfere with the Reaching Moon temple, so most of the extra deaths were among the Hendrikei, the Praxians, the Tarshites and the Grazelanders. So I would expect those groups to be weaker comparatively. Also, the Dragonrise killed most of the Lunar sympathizers in Sartar, so conflict was clearly diminished. The next two battles (Dangerford and Queens) are comparatively small affairs because both sides have been bled white, one side by the Winter and the other by the Dragonrise.

As for actual death tally, my opinion is that it is left deliberately ambiguous, specially if you wish to play through those years.

If you like a grimdark game, you may kill half the clan and have people starving wherever the PCs go. You can have bandits and outlaws stealing the meagre crops and bloody fights for the last living cow.

If you prefer a Sartar forever game, you may have the temples opening reserves and magical sources of nourishment (such as Geos's) and have players organizing expeditions to obtain food from other parts of Glorantha or finding other alternative resources, heroquests to increase the fishing in the River-Creek, or agreements with Uz to feed the clan with giant grubs. Make the players part of the solution and the reason why there are so few deaths.

Or you may even could have a Lunar game, convincing the authorities to bring loads of rice from the Oslir to Sartar, to show the barbarians the benefits of the Empire.

If you play during the years, it should be one of the main drivers for adventure that period. Or you can do as we do, and the players (who are not Ernalda or Orlanth cultists) move to Safelster, though in this case the siege of Nochet was the main driver for the change. 

If you just skip them as past history, it lets you kill anyone you prefer death, and probably create all kinds of adventure hooks for later, from those who accepted the Lunars' rice being ostracized or persecuted by other clans, to the consequences of cannibalism among the Orlanthi (ogres) and making new enemies and friends, depending on who helped and who raided their neighbours.

[Akhôrahil]

The worst famines in history killed about 20% of the population (The Great Potato Famine had 15% and the Holodomor 13% as a comparison), and the Great Winter in Sartar at least is undeniably pretty damned bad - I have a hard time picturing less than 10% dead in Sartar, although it was likely considerably better in Lunar Tarsh (where emergency shipments or even just trade probably helped). Above 30%, and the population would have a seriously hard time recovering to 1627. So somewhere around 10-30%? 

If we agree that RQ models the available magic (re: Bless Pregnancy), then every fertile woman in Sartar can have 1.55 children per year if desired, which very quickly makes up for losses in total population (and clans like the Red Cow can bring out Orlanth's Rattle if they want to accelerate things even further).

Edited June 7, 2023 by Akhôrahil

[Eff]

7 hours ago, DrGoth said:

We also have this note from the last reference "“The total population has recovered since the Great Winter three years ago, although the population is disproportionately made up
of young children and adults, with fewer than normal elders.”

So in the real world, what happened during famines or prolonged loss of agricultural productivity is that peasant families would feed young and middle-aged adult men and women first, followed by teenagers, and would essentially leave young children and the elderly to die from malnutrition or starvation. Supposedly, the "Great Winter" in 1622-23 is followed by unproductive years in 1623-24 and 1624-25, only regressing to the mean after the Dragonrise. 

So these "young children", assuming that this means less than eight years old (halfway to initiation for boys), would have been five years old and younger in the Great Winter, meaning at vulnerable ages for dying in real-world famine scenarios, and a number of them would have been born in the lean years. If they are present in great numbers, it therefore must follow that the Great Winter could not have been very bad, much less bad than a lean year in the real world. And so it's only the elderly that died disproportionately. 

But perhaps by "young children", what was intended was the very natural reading of "three years and younger, disproportionately less than a year old", and we are meant to assume that there's a large gap wherein children too young to contribute to meager agriculture died off in 1622-23, along with the elderly. But from the straightforward English, the Great Winter seems like it might well be nearly demographically invisible in the medium term, whacking the tip off the population pyramid but not massively slimming the population down. 

[Ormi Phengaria]

8 hours ago, DrGoth said:

So that would take a sustained doubling of the normal birth rate since the Great Winter. Possible, but a bit of a stretch.  I can't see it being any higher. 

The birth rate in any society isn't just a socially immutable constant, but something which changes as people take account of the conditions around themselves and how their family will survive and hopefully prosper. It appears exceptionally rare for even the most devastatingly high-mortality famines to have major, direct impacts on even short- to medium-term demographics for this reason. The young and the elderly disproportionately die, but birth rates immediately spike following famines, perhaps as there is less demand for food but roughly the same level of productivity. So the Great Winter is not out of the ordinary in that consideration.

Edited June 7, 2023 by Ormi Phengaria

[Akhôrahil]

2 hours ago, Ormi Phengaria said:

It appears exceptionally rare for even the most devastatingly high-mortality famines to have major, direct impacts on even short- to medium-term demographics for this reason.

Interestingly, they can have a long-term impact on population if they’re combined with migration associated with the famine - Ireland still hasn’t exceeded its population pre-famine after over a century and a half.

But yeah, this doesn’t seem relevant for Sartar. Presumably Argrath will have some issues with recruiting once that demographic chasm arrives in the right age cohort, though.

Edited June 7, 2023 by Akhôrahil

[soltakss]

17 hours ago, JRE said:

The problem for these calculations is Magic, as Glorantha is not earth. The positive impact may be much higher than doubling the birth rate in the joyful years after the return of Orlanth and Ernalda, and the surge of fertility magics that come with it. Another factor, for me, is religious festivals, which mean that women without partners, but also post-menopause women and even men (though that will be rare), depending on your reading of the Pregnancy spell, may become pregnant when Fertility magic runs high.

During the Great Winter Ernaldans lost their Rune Magic as well as Orlanthi. People that rely on magic have a big shock when it stops.

[Joerg]

The confederation cities attracted refugees from the famine and saw some increase in resident numbers. The rural outback would have lost population.

[Akhôrahil]

1 hour ago, soltakss said:

During the Great Winter Ernaldans lost their Rune Magic as well as Orlanthi. People that rely on magic have a big shock when it stops.

I think this was about regaining the population post-Windstop, though - if we imagine that fertile women make up 30% of the population and Bless Pregnancy is used, almost 5% of the population could be recovered yearly (the number of natural deaths will be reduced for a number of years as a lot of the elderly and the young died during the Great Winter already).

[DrGoth]

Thanks All

I'm getting a very much "it depends on the sort of game you want" feeling.

I argument I do see against the "just throw open the birth rate" idea is the cost the clans would incur raising all those children.  Not too easy. Also I'm not sure refugees would head from the countryside the the cities. I would have thought it just as likely to head the other way, with the countryside ceasing to send food tot the cities as supplies ran low. It's that thought that made me wonder in the first place, when i noticed the city populations weren't changing.

The potato famine figure (15%)is also interesting. That crippled Ireland for decades, if not generations.  Sartar does not seem to be hit so hard, so I'm wondering if a lesser figure is more likely.  Taking the possibility of magically supported fertility versus the apparent effect versus something like the potato famine I'm wondering if 5% is unreasonable. Of course, refer to my first comment.

Edited June 8, 2023 by DrGoth

[Akhôrahil]

1 hour ago, DrGoth said:

I argument I do see against the "just throw open the birth rate" idea is the cost the clans would incur raising all those children.  Not too easy.

While true, they would have taken huge losses among the younger children during the Great Winter, so to a significant extent this would just mean replacing them. No extra load from that.

1 hour ago, DrGoth said:

The potato famine figure (15%)is also interesting. That crippled Ireland for decades, if not generations. 

Migration caused by the famine was the larger factor, though. That doesn't significantly happen in Sartar.

[Eff]

1 hour ago, DrGoth said:

Thanks All

I'm getting a very much "it depends on the sort of game you want" feeling.

I argument I do see against the "just throw open the birth rate" idea is the cost the clans would incur raising all those children.  Not too easy. Also I'm not sure refugees would head from the countryside the the cities. I would have thought it just as likely to head the other way, with the countryside ceasing to send food tot the cities as supplies ran low. It's that thought that made me wonder in the first place, when i noticed the city populations weren't changing.

The potato famine figure (15%)is also interesting. That crippled Ireland for decades, if not generations.  Sartar does not seem to be hit so hard, so I'm wondering if a lesser figure is more likely.  Taking the possibility of magically supported fertility versus the apparent effect versus something like the potato famine I'm wondering if 5% is unreasonable. Of course, refer to my first comment.

A lot of any deeper analysis would have to look at agricultural productivity per person, because I think with a large-scale die-off you're looking at the potential for population decline and slow recovery, if ever, as overall agricultural production dips in the generation that died in large numbers and thus the population stabilizes at a lower level, increasing very slowly overall. Ireland, for example, continued to decline in population for a century after the Great Famine ended, even as agriculture mechanized further, and only in 2016 did the population of the island increase past the point it was at immediately post-Great Famine. 

Now, we could say that magic would make up for the loss of production, but I'm skeptical. Why wouldn't that magic be used to maintain a higher equilibrium to begin with? What makes it more of an option after famines? Is it simply that the gods maintain certain population targets and shift magic to meet them? 

[mfbrandi]

5 hours ago, Akhôrahil said:

if we imagine that fertile women make up 30% of the population and Bless Pregnancy is used, almost 5% of the population could be recovered yearly

I refer the court to Exhibit 1: We Who Are About To … by Joanna Russ.

Spoiler

In We Who Are About To ... (January-February 1976 Galaxy; 1977), the survivors of a crash on a planet inimical to human life treat their situation as a Robinsonade in the making, attempting to deny the fact that their deaths are inevitable once their limited supplies run out (see also discussion under Tom Godwin of “The Cold Equations” [August 1954 Astounding]). The tale is narrated by a woman who refuses to be coerced into being made pregnant in line with the dominant group’s delusional adherence to an Adam and Eve model of their situation (see Colonization of Other Worlds) and feels herself forced to kill them to prevent being raped (see Sex; Women in SF); in the end, alone but enhanced by visionary moments, she prepares for her inescapable Suicide. — John Clute, Encyclopedia of Science Fiction

I am not saying the Orlanthi are all going to die in the recovery period, but the way this is being discussed makes the situation sound like a women’s rights nightmare.

See also Gilead.

Responses along the lines of “this is voluntary, the women all really, really want to be made magically fertile” sound to me like “they are all gagging for it”. I am NOT accusing anyone here of that, but a focus on the numbers can result in losing sight of the fact that this is a human situation. We surely don’t want to treat the surviving women “of reproductive age” as cows on a factory farm awaiting the visit of the “AI man”. (And yes, certainly, many people don’t want that for our cows, either.)

Perhaps if anyone in the tribe gets too gung-ho with their repopulation plans, the Babeester Gor cult can bring a little [ahem!] sanity to the situation.

[Eff]

What's perhaps most relevant to using Bless Pregnancy for a babypalooza is that in a world without baby formula, there's a fairly hard limit on the ability to have children who survive past infancy- breast milk production, which in the real world is quite often inadequate for a single infant, let alone large numbers of twins, and which requires lactating women producing to excess to serve as wetnurses, who would be in shorter supply in this hypothetical situation of mass magically-assisted pregnancy. So quite apart from the social limits, there are clear physical limits at work here. 

[mfbrandi]

14 minutes ago, Eff said:

there are clear physical limits at work here

Sure, but don’t you think there has been a bit of a tone of “let’s see just how hard we can push up against those physical limits — ’cos why wouldn’t we?” in the discussion here? If I am tone deaf, it wouldn’t be the first time.

As for social limits, I had in mind something more like ethical limits: things one can push past but shouldn’t. (The things that chaotics like me always get accused of ignoring.)

[DrGoth]

I think we do need to loo

25 minutes ago, Eff said:

 there are clear physical limits at work here. 

And, as you say, other limits as well. Which all makes me think the figure is at the low end, not the high end.

[Eff]

1 minute ago, mfbrandi said:

Sure, but don’t you think there has been a bit of a tone of “let’s see just how hard we can push up against those physical limits — ’cos why wouldn’t we?” in the discussion here? If I am tone deaf, it wouldn’t be the first time.

As for social limits, I had in mind something more like ethical limits: things one can push past but shouldn’t. (The things that chaotics like me always get accused of ignoring.)

I think that there is straightforwardly a gigantic swamp to wade into when considering this situation from a social perspective because the argument is built on population numbers at two separate dates. While it would be extremely improbable for the outlined situations to happen spontaneously and totally voluntarily for most human societies in the real world, it is of course always possible to argue that Sartarites or Gloranthans are different, that they have a protonationalistic urge to produce children for the nation among women in such numbers as to make this scenario socially possible and ethical. But since it is physically very unlikely, that short-circuits that. 

Besides, I'm not sure if the Babeester Gor of the recent texts actually would intervene in that situation given that she's been subtly redefined to defending "the Earth" rather than "women" generally, and given the whole focus on pregnancy in the recent texts for the Ernalda cult, would it be a transgression against the Earth to pressure people into doing what the Earth cults are apparently built around? Which would bring in the question of canon as well. 

[mfbrandi]

1 hour ago, Eff said:

I'm not sure if the Babeester Gor of the recent texts actually would intervene in that situation given that she's been subtly redefined to defending "the Earth" rather than "women" generally, and given the whole focus on pregnancy in the recent texts for the Ernalda cult, would it be a transgression against the Earth to pressure people into doing what the Earth cults are apparently built around? Which would bring in the question of canon as well. 

But if the celibate labrys-wielding sisters — presumably originally an expression of male insecurity about feminism (they must be monsters, etcetera) — became enforcers for Gilead or accepted pregnancy for themselves to get with the programme, then the hell with canon.

[Eff]

27 minutes ago, mfbrandi said:

But if the celibate labrys-wielding sisters — presumably originally an expression of male insecurity about feminism (they must be monsters, etcetera) — became enforcers for Gilead or accepted pregnancy for themselves to get with the programme, then the hell with canon.

The point is to avoid getting into the weeds of canon arguments, however. 

[DrGoth]

I'd rather it didn't devolve to anything like that. Which (at least for my Glorantha) works like:

to avoid those problems you can't have that much of a focus on wild numbers of pregnancies.

therefore the numbers of deaths are a lot lower than something like the potato famine.

 

All I was trying to do was get a feel for the mortality rate, to understand what would be the best way to portray that in a game.  Take a 600 person clan. Maybe 20 steads?

An extra 2.5% death rate is 15 people.  That's less than one a stead

5% is 30 people 1, in some cases 2 a stead

7.5% is 45 people 2, in some cases 3 a stead

(and yes, I know averages are only that)

These cases would feel different.  "It was hard and we went hungry and some people lost a family member" to "everyone lost people. Some lost a lot. It was terrible."

My own opinion is 5% is the top of the range, and I'd probably run closer to 2.5%. Which still requires a sustained 50% surge in the birth rate for three years. Such a surge happened according the adventure book, it just doesn't tell us how big. So either we discount that, or each choose a figure we find acceptable. For a 600 person clan and my a rough figure of 60 year life expectancy you're going from 10 births a year to 15. YGWV.

Edited June 9, 2023 by DrGoth

[jajagappa]

Heortland is one of the places that suffers heavily during this period, but not just from the Great Winter, but also Lunar occupation, subsequent rebellion and feuds, and waves of scorpionmen from the Footprint, and constant harassment by Wolf Pirates. And of course, some migration to Nochet and other Esrolian cities.

In 1621, as noted in the Guide, it is at 628,000. By 1625, even with the renewed fertility from Ernalda's return, it has fallen to 508,000 - roughly a 20% decline.

[DrGoth]

2 hours ago, jajagappa said:

Heortland is one of the places that suffers heavily during this period, but not just from the Great Winter, but also Lunar occupation, subsequent rebellion and feuds, and waves of scorpionmen from the Footprint, and constant harassment by Wolf Pirates. And of course, some migration to Nochet and other Esrolian cities.

In 1621, as noted in the Guide, it is at 628,000. By 1625, even with the renewed fertility from Ernalda's return, it has fallen to 508,000 - roughly a 20% decline.

Ouch- that's a lot.  Where's the 508k figure from?

[French Desperate WindChild]

17 hours ago, mfbrandi said:

I refer the court to Exhibit 1: We Who Are About To … by Joanna Russ.

I am not saying the Orlanthi are all going to die in the recovery period, but the way this is being discussed makes the situation sound like a women’s rights nightmare.

See also Gilead.

 

that's a way but these novels are not in the same context. They are written in our world (the authors I mean), in the "western" part of the world, exposing western issues (I m not saying there are not the same issues in the other parts of the world, just I dislike the "what is true in my location  is true anywhere" position) .

Are ernaldan in Sartar (and Esrolia ?!) in the same situation than women in the "Eve is guilty so women are lower than men" cultures ? I m not sure at all.

At least not in my glorantha

 

17 hours ago, mfbrandi said:

 this is a human situation. We surely don’t want to treat the surviving women “of reproductive age” as cows on a factory farm awaiting the visit of the “AI man”. (And yes, certainly, many people don’t want that for our cows, either.)

the babyboom is another human situation. I did not hear that those who became mothers during this period did it because they accepted (or were forced) to reach the "cow status".

Imho,  outside of any religious/cultural context, what is a human situation is "after a big crisis, a real nightmare" (so ww2, great winter, ...) a large part of human see a good future, full of hope of prosperity, peace, progress, etc... so a world when they want to see their children flourishing". *

Of course then, add context, add people expectation, state control, religious and/or social pressure and it mitigates what I said

 

* by the way the two stories you used (We Who Are About To / Gilead) are not "after a big crisis", but "a -bad- solution during a big crisis"

 

17 hours ago, mfbrandi said:

Perhaps if anyone in the tribe gets too gung-ho with their repopulation plans, the Babeester Gor cult can bring a little [ahem!] sanity to the situation.

As Babeester Gor cult is the avenger part of Ernalda cult, and as I consider that :

- Ernalda cult is the "true" power in Sartar (more hidden than in Esrolia of course, but not so much),

- the "babyboom" is not a (full) planified thing,

Bab'sisters have nothing to "say"

 

Now that is for Sartar and Ernalda the queen, I don't know what to think about Prax, where Eiritha is ... a cow right ? Same for Peloria, before the red moon, where Yelm decided everything. Same in Sun couny, etc..

 

[David Scott]

For my Prax campaign, I worked up all the population numbers for all of the tribes 1621-1626. These were essentially hand crafted, as it took in location, and events such as the Windstop, and Moonbroth II.

For example, the Impala baseline is 120k is 1621. They were not affected bt the Windstop in 1622 as nearly all were in the Wastes, but were affected by the following two "Year of Kids" population explosion. Stabilising in 1625 at 121869, then as the events of Moonbroth II I inflicted a 5% loss leaving 115486. The Bison were also not affected by the Windstop.

The Sables however faired differently: two of the five phrateries were pro lunar and in Prax, likewise the two conservative ones, and the neutral one was in the wastes. With the baseline of 75k in 1621, about 3k were lost in the Windstop, with the remainder either staying under Lunar protection or moving out to the Wastes or hunkering down in the Paps. The following two "Year of Kids" population explosion. Stabilising in 1625 at 73122. The horrendous outcome of Moonbroth with the subsequent genocide of the pro-Lunar phrateries (uninitiated children absorbed by the remaining three), dropped the population to 39486.

The Morokanth were hit hard as their ancestral grazing is in Prax (about 3k), but many sheltered in the Paps, reducing the loss.

Revisiting these numbers, I would certainly adjust the Moonbroth 5% outcome to reflect the cults involved (making it likely a 3-4%, not 5% reduction)

Tribes affected by the Windstop:

High Llama, Sable, Morokanth, Newtlings, Pavis Survivors, Unicorn Women, Baboons, Pol-Joni. Generally a reduction 0.04 x 1621 population.

Year of kids is an increase 1.0062 for each year (1623, 1624)

Moonbroth II is 0.5 (half population - adults only) x loss of 0.005

These are just ballpark figures to give me an idea of what was happening. FYI the 1.0062 comes from calculating the growth rate from the dawn numbers using https://www.metamorphosisalpha.com/ias/population.html

 

 

[JRE]

6 hours ago, jajagappa said:

In 1621, as noted in the Guide, it is at 628,000. By 1625, even with the renewed fertility from Ernalda's return, it has fallen to 508,000 - roughly a 20% decline.

That includes two years of civil war with religious civil war overtones, and strong foreign intervention, so it not clear how much is hunger driven, as those are the bloodiest.

Ernalda's fertility will not have helped much as the full return is in Sea season 1624. 

Compared to that, Sartar was unusually peaceful during that period, probably what Tatius wanted, to keep the Reaching Moon Temple project moving forward.

I strongly support making the Winter as hard as you need, but not really terrible except for those clans who are not friends of the Lunars or the Tribal kings and without local heroes willing to do extraordinary feats.

As for magic, I consider that the rulebook spells just are a small part of the actual magic, with much more magic that is not formulaic. So anyone that goes to an Ernaldan fertility ritual just after Ernalda's return is very likely to end pregnant, and with my reading of the Pregnancy spell, that may well include men and post menopause women. And "all" (an Orlanthi all) those pregnancies will be light, and carried to term. Crops will grow plentiful and fast, cattle will have multiple healthy births, while the grass grows overnight so there is always enough. Do not quantify it, it is Magic, the accumulated magic of several years released in one powerful go. No problem if you combine accelerate Growth, bless whatever, and anything you need to show this is a magical world.