Mythology is out!

[metcalph]

https://www.chaosium.com/cults-of-runequest-mythology-hardcover/

No hardcopy in Oz yet.

PDFs buyable here:

https://www.chaosium.com/cults-of-runequest-mythology-pdf/

 

Edited October 9, 2023 by metcalph

[Martin Dick]

It will let me order the hardcopy, but will only ship it from the US 😔 and at AUD$70.00 shipping, it will have to wait

[metcalph]

Brief observations 

- The mythical kingdoms (Brilliance etc) don't quite line up with the Guide.  Wasn't expecting them to and the in-gloranthan list of references suggests why this might be so.

- The Carmanians worship Malakinus (9%) separately from Idovanus (10%) and Ganesatarus (2%).   Possibly Malakinus is a Lunarized version of the IG?

- God Forgot has a large proportion of non-IG worshippers (about 70% in total).  I suspect this is refugees from the war.

- The Seven Mothers is surprisingly prominent among the  Bison, Impala, High Llama and Rhino.  1% each as opposed to the near-zero I would have expected.  Might be slaves.  

 

[jajagappa]

Love the calendar! Like how it connects to the real-world Mayan calendar both in design and deity iconography. It's cool how the Sacred Time was worked into an inner circle around Arachne Solara. I also love how the calendar reappears as the icon for Time in the genealogy of the Celestial Court!

The reimagined view of the Cosmology is lovely as well. Really need the hardcopy to view from all directions. The can-can dancers in the sky, all nicely in sync, are great, as well as the sky river dragon. 🙂 

Interesting how Lhankor Mhy appears in two distinct genealogies with different parents: Yelm and Dendara; and Acos and Orenoar.

Great to see the Copper Plates in color!

The mythic maps will definitely keep me busy exploring for awhile too.

 

[Starcarr]

This is the one I’ve been most looking forward t!o! Not a fan of the cover though. 

[trystero]

Quick note since there's no dedicated corrections thread yet: on the back cover, in the last paragraph, "Cults of Glorantha" should be "Cults of RuneQuest". Unless there's a separate Cults of Glorantha supplement/series that I'm unaware of.

[jajagappa]

4 hours ago, Starcarr said:

Not a fan of the cover though.

I'm sure there will be different takes on the artwork.

Personally, I like the idea of a Gathering of Gods from across the pantheons for the Mythology book. It provides us with additional views of many figures in different representations from the other books while still from the same artist so a consistency in style. 

The continued mix of styles within the book (Loic, Agathe, and Katrin's distinct visions) is a real plus. Looking forward to the hard copy where I can readily see the whole picture and follow the details easily.

[Ian Absentia]

4 hours ago, Starcarr said:

Not a fan of the cover though. 

The corporate team photo pose?

!i!

[AndreJarosch]

5 hours ago, jajagappa said:

Interesting how Lhankor Mhy appears in two distinct genealogies with different parents: Yelm and Dendara; and Acos and Orenoar.

First one being Buserian, the socond the Lightbringer Lhankor Mhy. 
But the Godlearners tell us it is the same deity. 

[Jakob]

Just now, Ian Absentia said:

The corporate team photo pose?

!i!

Damn, now I can't unsee it!

[Richard S.]

Very nice book, as usual. I think I'm going to wait for the errata before getting my hardcover this time though.

I really, really, really, really like the picture of Orlanthi riding dragons. EWF!

5 hours ago, Starcarr said:

This is the one I’ve been most looking forward t!o! Not a fan of the cover though. 

I'm kinda mixed on it. On one hand I like the mix of gods and the variety in how they're portrayed - Argan Argar and Valid especially stick out to me. On the other hand I gotta agree with the "corporate pose" comment, mostly because of how Vinga's posed.

14 minutes ago, AndreJarosch said:

First one being Buserian, the socond the Lightbringer Lhankor Mhy. 
But the Godlearners tell us it is the same deity. 

Given that several of those god learners were beardies themselves, I think they had a point on that one at least.

[Rodney Dangerduck]

2 hours ago, Richard S. said:

I think I'm going to wait for the errata before getting my hardcover this time though

Do they reprint the books with corrections?

[Richard S.]

56 minutes ago, Rodney Dangerduck said:

Do they reprint the books with corrections?

I assume so, otherwise there's not much point to the corrections threads

[Jason Farrell]

1 hour ago, Richard S. said:

I assume so, otherwise there's not much point to the corrections threads

Except they don't.  They haven't so far, at any rate.  They don't even update the .pdfs, they just put the errata on a website somewhere.

Edited October 10, 2023 by Jason Farrell

[g33k]

3 hours ago, Rodney Dangerduck said:

Do they reprint the books with corrections?

2 hours ago, Richard S. said:

I assume so, otherwise there's not much point to the corrections threads

20 minutes ago, Jason Farrell said:

Except they don't.  They haven't so far, at any rate.  They don't even update the .pdfs, they just put the errata on a website somewhere.

They don't usually jump all over the updates; they collect a fair number, and then do one big update.

Errata tend to slow down after a while.  I don't know if they're waiting for a particular rate (fewer than 3 per week?  fewer than 3 per month?) or absolute numbers (more than 375 individual errata?  more than 750?) but they do incorporate them, eventually.

I wouldn't have expected an updated PDF yet, however... maybe another month or so, for the Prosopaedia?  And a month later for CoR:LB & CoR:EG?  Very much guesses on my part, not knowledge!

They have already produced a 2nd printing of the core rulebook, with errata included; and are continuing to collect errata; I think (but haven't double-checked) that the PDF for the 2nd printing is newer (with included errata) than the 2nd printing itself.

They have stated that there's going to be another printing of the Starter Set, with errata included.

I'm unclear about other volumes in the RQG lineup.

[kalidor]

Art is great, Cult distribution charts and "What happens in Sacred Time" are good but sadly no relationship charts between Cults, most of the information is in other sources and the information about heroquesting and every myth, particulary "I fought we won" is almost a footnote. 

My opinion of course, we need the setting going foward, we are locked in 1625 for more than two years and we really need the GM book for battles and heroquesting at the same level that the shamanic rules in the core book. I think is not too much.

And the answer "use JC material" is a poor excuse. No serius company says "hey I know my product is lacking of a component I am talking about  all the time, but look!, use a third party product to compensate while I decide when I should fix it"

Edited October 10, 2023 by kalidor

[Steve]

5 hours ago, Jason Farrell said:

Except they don't.  They haven't so far, at any rate.  They don't even update the .pdfs, they just put the errata on a website somewhere.

The Glorantha Sourcebook PDF was updated with corrections not too long after it was published.

[Joerg]

15 hours ago, AndreJarosch said:

First one being Buserian, the socond the Lightbringer Lhankor Mhy. 
But the Godlearners tell us it is the same deity. 

By extension, this tells us about a certain amount of identity between Dendara and Orenoar, and Acos and Yelm? The latter two certainly share the unchanging overarching dome aspect, tho former the female purity in the sky.

A deity being born several times in mythic cycles would be nothing surprising to the recipient of the vedas, with the five brothers themselves being such incarnations.

[Wheel Shield]

I love the cover. I especially love Vinga. I don’t spend a lot of time studying corporate personnel staff pages or corporate trade magazines, so now that I am aware of such things, I am promptly forgetting them.

To me, Vinga looks to be an optimistic and confident warrior, perfect for Orlanthi. I’d be glad to have her in my warband.

Edited October 10, 2023 by Wheel Shield

[Richard S.]

I just noticed that Malkion and his parents got a spot on the big genealogy chart. I think this is the first image we've ever gotten of him.

[Rodney Dangerduck]

2 hours ago, Wheel Shield said:

I love the cover. I especially love Vinga. I don’t spend a lot of time studying corporate personnel staff pages or corporate trade magazines, so now that I am aware of such things, I am promptly forgetting them.

To me, Vinga looks to be an optimistic and confident warrior, perfect for Orlanthi. I’d be glad to have her in my warband.

Agreed.  She also has a nice picture in the recent Cults book. 

What she doesn't have is much content.  She is "subsumed into another cult".  Disappointing.  There's only a little in the Cults book.  I realize that space and time are limited, and hopefully some Vinga content will appear later.

[Joerg]

8 minutes ago, Rodney Dangerduck said:

Agreed.  She also has a nice picture in the recent Cults book. 

What she doesn't have is much content.  She is "subsumed into another cult".  Disappointing.  There's only a little in the Cults book.  I realize that space and time are limited, and hopefully some Vinga content will appear later.

Vinga as a goddess doesn't have much beyond being the female who is Orlanth (or his daughter among the Storm Brothers). As a Storm Brother, she is one of the many, blending in despite being somewhat different, "one of the boys".

Vinga as society's model for a particular non-binary gender expression is a bit different.

In Thunder Rebels, the ideals of (oart of) Heortling society defined divine roles (Allfather, Allmother), taking away a certain amount of divine nature and replacing it with human values. Sanctifying society into cult objects. Among others, this resulted in a cult of Ernalda that may have been differently magically powerful but dreadfully limited in female mystery cult aspects, or, as Claudia Loroff put it, sex, drugs, and rock'n'roll. The Goodwife, and her Faithful Husband. Juno, with a less flamboyant husband.

The Storm Tribe treatment of Vinga was a symptom of this combined with subcultitis.

Now I will admit that adding one of the Thunder Brother identities to your standard Orlanth initiation offered a fair bit of variety interpreting the "yeah, another Orlanth worshiper" yawn.

But the cult, the connection to the divine, doesn't have to match a person's occupation 100%. Having access to magic useful in such pursuits may well be an advantage, but you won't have this magic up all the time.

In the end, it is not your personal on the job magic but your community's communal magic and blessings that provide for the community. Your redsmith's Heat Metal won't influence your yearly income roll.

[Rodney Dangerduck]

2 hours ago, Joerg said:

Vinga as a goddess doesn't have much

Not much? At a cursory glance...

1. Throwing javelins and protecting Mahome and leaping on treetops and running on snow to defeat Valind?
2. Many other tales of her Defending Storm defending the Stead (often along with Elmal)?  Where she "inspires the seemingly defenseless to defend themselves."
3. Vestantes, “the Fightin’est Woman,” who defeated every male challenger in the land
4. How her hair turned red?
5. Throwing her javelin exactly one mile to help measure fields
6. Being "present at difficult childbirths" 
7. Wearing a knee-length skirt worn over men’s trousers.
8. "Every childless widow among the Kheldon Tribe dyed her hair red that winter"
9. How she joined the Storm Brothers (though I know Greg didn't like this tale)

There was a lot.  I agree that there was subcultitis.  I never actually played Hero Wars, but it seems a shame to totally drop so much good or interesting material as "non-canonical".  Especially as many of the important NPCs are prominent members of the Vinga cult.  In the standard Colymar campaign Leika is the Queen of the PCs.  Might be nice to have more information about her cult.

[Jeff]

10 minutes ago, Rodney Dangerduck said:

Not much? At a cursory glance...

1. Throwing javelins and protecting Mahome and leaping on treetops and running on snow to defeat Valind?
2. Many other tales of her Defending Storm defending the Stead (often along with Elmal)?  Where she "inspires the seemingly defenseless to defend themselves."
3. Vestantes, “the Fightin’est Woman,” who defeated every male challenger in the land
4. How her hair turned red?
5. Throwing her javelin exactly one mile to help measure fields
6. Being "present at difficult childbirths" 
7. Wearing a knee-length skirt worn over men’s trousers.
8. "Every childless widow among the Kheldon Tribe dyed her hair red that winter"
9. How she joined the Storm Brothers (though I know Greg didn't like this tale)

There was a lot.  I agree that there was subcultitis.  I never actually played Hero Wars, but it seems a shame to totally drop so much good or interesting material as "non-canonical".  Especially as many of the important NPCs are prominent members of the Vinga cult.  In the standard Colymar campaign Leika is the Queen of the PCs.  Might be nice to have more information about her cult.

Well Greg and I decided to not use most of this stuff. So for us it wasn't there to use.

[Richard S.]

32 minutes ago, Rodney Dangerduck said:

Not much? At a cursory glance...

1. Throwing javelins and protecting Mahome and leaping on treetops and running on snow to defeat Valind?
2. Many other tales of her Defending Storm defending the Stead (often along with Elmal)?  Where she "inspires the seemingly defenseless to defend themselves."
3. Vestantes, “the Fightin’est Woman,” who defeated every male challenger in the land
4. How her hair turned red?
5. Throwing her javelin exactly one mile to help measure fields
6. Being "present at difficult childbirths" 
7. Wearing a knee-length skirt worn over men’s trousers.
8. "Every childless widow among the Kheldon Tribe dyed her hair red that winter"
9. How she joined the Storm Brothers (though I know Greg didn't like this tale)

There was a lot.  I agree that there was subcultitis.  I never actually played Hero Wars, but it seems a shame to totally drop so much good or interesting material as "non-canonical".  Especially as many of the important NPCs are prominent members of the Vinga cult.  In the standard Colymar campaign Leika is the Queen of the PCs.  Might be nice to have more information about her cult.

Those can still be important stories for Vingans to follow if you want to use them, but I'd say that pretty much every god has had just as much if not more of their myths left untold in published books.

In any case, maybe someone wants to start a Vinga thread instead of hijacking this one more?