Differences between Brithini and Mostali

[Scott Mayne 7]

On 3/1/2017 at 3:45 PM, Patrick said:

About the dreariness of land: well, don't forget that Brithini Zzaburi practice tapping. Maybe infrequently, but they live forever. And typically stay in the same lands.

There is something rotten in Brithos...

Brithos isn't the wasteland that some might think it is (far from it, actually). A while back (on an old mailing list) Greg commented about the natural energies of the island not being tapped:

"You speak of Arolanit, of course, where even the air is gray from being tapped. This never happened to Brithos..."

For one reason why, the mother of the Brithini was the land goddess Britha herself:

"The Brithini were a powerful human race from before the darkness. Their Founder was named MALKION and they are sometimes called the Malkioni. Malkion had four sons and one daughter by the goddess Britha, an earth deity."

Brithini/Zzaburi exploitation of nature took a variety of forms, not just tapping; for example:

"Zzabur, the Sorcerer Supreme, who was capable of making nature work for him, such as when he made the windmills to help heat his cities. He did this by proving to his people that Malkion had created the world for them to exploit."

[Darius West 944]

What is the Mostali attitude to tapping?  

10 minutes ago, Scott Mayne said:

For one reason why, the mother of the Brithini was the land goddess Britha herself:

"The Brithini were a powerful human race from before the darkness. Their Founder was named MALKION and they are sometimes called the Malkioni. Malkion had four sons and one daughter by the goddess Britha, an earth deity."

This makes the Brithini what the ancient greeks called "authochthonous" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autochthon_(ancient_Greece)

But seriously, I have forgotten what the mostali attitude to tapping is. Where is it even written up?

[soltakss 4,700]

14 hours ago, Scott Mayne said:

For one reason why, the mother of the Brithini was the land goddess Britha herself:

"The Brithini were a powerful human race from before the darkness. Their Founder was named MALKION and they are sometimes called the Malkioni. Malkion had four sons and one daughter by the goddess Britha, an earth deity."

This is something that people often forget. Malkion himself was the product of a Storm Demigod and a Sea Nymph, Waertag was the product of Malkiion and a Sea Nymph, Malkion's other sons came from Britha and the Serpent Kings were descended from Seshnela. Although Brithini are atheists and socially restricted, they did get jiggy with a lot of deities, although they did not treat them as deities. Nowadays, we think of the Brithini as caste-bound, very restricted in who they can marry, but this was not always the case.

 

 

 

[davecake 1,556]

A Zzaburi is tried only by other Zzaburi if the crime is one that only involves other zzaburi. So if a zzaburi attacks another with sorcery, that is a zzaburi matter, but if they attack any other caste, or do anything that effects the entire community, then they are judged by a Talar. 

I suspect that zzabur courts mostly discuss crimes of doctrine and heresy. 

[davecake 1,556]

On 06/03/2017 at 9:47 AM, soltakss said:

This is something that people often forget. Malkion himself was the product of a Storm Demigod and a Sea Nymph, Waertag was the product of Malkiion and a Sea Nymph, Malkion's other sons came from Britha and the Serpent Kings were descended from Seshnela. Although Brithini are atheists and socially restricted, they did get jiggy with a lot of deities, although they did not treat them as deities. Nowadays, we think of the Brithini as caste-bound, very restricted in who they can marry, but this was not always the case.

Ironically, the group that really did rigidly stuck to caste rules about who they marry would appear to be the Vadeli, which is why they are still distinctly Brown and Red. 

[Tcneseis 15]

21 hours ago, davecake said:

A Zzaburi is tried only by other Zzaburi if the crime is one that only involves other zzaburi. So if a zzaburi attacks another with sorcery, that is a zzaburi matter, but if they attack any other caste, or do anything that effects the entire community, then they are judged by a Talar.

I see this is in the Guide to Glorantha, so I am catching up.

A lot of details which belonged to Middle Age terminology have been changed.

 

[Darius West 944]

Seriously, does anyone know what the Mostali attitude to tapping is?  I can't find a reference to it anywhere.

[Scott Mayne 7]

1 hour ago, Darius West said:

Seriously, does anyone know what the Mostali attitude to tapping is?  I can't find a reference to it anywhere.

I didn't find anything either. However, tapping damages matter by extracting energy, which would seem to be anathema to them - I doubt orthodox Mostali even have the knowledge of how to tap. Just because the Mostali and Malkioni both use sorcery, doesn't mean they have the same repertoire of spells.

Then again, they didn't balk when their Vadeli allies attacked the Tadeniti people, separated them into matter and energy (i.e., tapped the heck out of them), and gave the matter to the Mostali. 

[Joerg 4,300]

7 hours ago, Scott Mayne said:

I didn't find anything either. However, tapping damages matter by extracting energy, which would seem to be anathema to them - I doubt orthodox Mostali even have the knowledge of how to tap. Just because the Mostali and Malkioni both use sorcery, doesn't mean they have the same repertoire of spells.

Then again, they didn't balk when their Vadeli allies attacked the Tadeniti people, separated them into matter and energy (i.e., tapped the heck out of them), and gave the matter to the Mostali. 

I suppose the Mostali approve of everything that holds the uncontrolled spreading of Grower and its minions in check, but they get extremely angry when any part of the World Machine is weakened. The Tadeniti were some form of growth.

IMO Mostali sorcery doesn't have spells, but creates and powers artefacts. The net result may be very similar - how do you tell the difference between a bladesharped axe or an mostali-empowered axe?

We know from Vadel's journeys that the Mostali built energy traps, able to capture spirits from Bamatela. I don't think that they have any more direct magics to interact with spirits. They can transform substances, and they can control and empower made things - what more magic would they need?

[Darius West 944]

On 3/12/2017 at 5:32 PM, Joerg said:

We know from Vadel's journeys that the Mostali built energy traps, able to capture spirits from Bamatela. I don't think that they have any more direct magics to interact with spirits. They can transform substances, and they can control and empower made things - what more magic would they need?

An interesting point... But do they have machines that slurp the life out of people to power things

[Joerg 4,300]

54 minutes ago, Darius West said:

An interesting point... But do they have machines that slurp the life out of people to power things

They can always put them into food and use alchemy to make sure that the magical ingredient "life" will be transformed to their best ability.

[Darius West 944]

On 3/17/2017 at 8:46 AM, Joerg said:

They can always put them into food and use alchemy to make sure that the magical ingredient "life" will be transformed to their best ability.

Beware of the hideous secrets behind Dwarven diet grimoires.

[Yelm's Light 269]

4 hours ago, Darius West said:

Beware of the hideous secrets behind Dwarven diet grimoires.

To Serve Mankind...

[davecake 1,556]

I think Mostali Tap without hesitation when necessary, and don't even really understand why others think it's wrong - individuality is an error, everything is part of the machine, you are just moving energy from one part to another. But Tap has a lack of efficiency, so introduces entropy, so is used sparingly by the good engineer - they don't hesitate, but nor do they use it as routinely as a Brithini or especially Vaseline would. 

I think the majority of Mostali magic is concentrated towards creating devices and manipulating objects, but not all. They are masters of enchanting, but still understand how to cast spells as needed.