Swords of Central Genertela

[JonL]

18 minutes ago, Atgxtg said:

Going back to Glorantha, I think that might be one the the differenes between the Lunar Empire and Rome. The Lunars don't seem to adopt as much from other coutures

Well, apart from the Dara Happans, and the Carmanians,  the Sable Riders, the Char-Un...

[Atgxtg]

2 minutes ago, JonL said:

Well, apart from the Dara Happans, and the Carmanians,  the Sable Riders, the Char-Un...

The adopt the people, but I don't see the Lunars riding sables. But then Rome started out as a city-state that expanded and merged with it's neighbors. The Lunar Empire was probably larger and with more of it's culture worked out. 

[Sir_Godspeed]

1 hour ago, Atgxtg said:

The adopt the people, but I don't see the Lunars riding sables. But then Rome started out as a city-state that expanded and merged with it's neighbors. The Lunar Empire was probably larger and with more of it's culture worked out. 

Well, "Lunars" is a bit of a difficult term, because the Lunars themselves didn't start off as a specific group, rather they are religious and cultural converts from a bunch of other cultures.

The Guide does count "Lunars" as separate from other cultures in its overview of the regions, but at least a plurality of the Lunars of the various areas are probably first- or second-generation converts as opposed to something like emigrants from Silver Shadow of First Blessed or whatever.

[SDLeary]

2 hours ago, Atgxtg said:

The Gladius Hispanica they did indeed get  from the Ibernerians, apparently after being given a "demonstration" of it's advantages over the spaetha. the oval shield was from the Gauls, although it might have come to them by way of the Greeks, along with pretty much everything else that was Greek.  Mail supposedly  originated with the Celts, but I think it was already widespread by the time the Romans got into Gaul.

They wouldn't have had to go all the way to Gaul, they had a small version in Italy. Basically everything from modern Florence, to the North, was Gallia Cisalpina... Gaul this side of the Alps. They never left after they sacked Rome.

2 hours ago, Atgxtg said:

Going back to Glorantha, I think that might be one the the differenes between the Lunar Empire and Rome. The Lunars don't seem to adopt as much from other coutures. 

There doesn't really seem much cultural adoption in any direction, at least not with main published sources, save by adventurers taking bits here and there to make it their own, regardless of their own origins.

SDLeary

[jeffjerwin]

2 hours ago, Atgxtg said:

Going back to Glorantha, I think that might be one the the differenes between the Lunar Empire and Rome. The Lunars don't seem to adopt as much from other coutures. 

The entirety of Lunar culture is an artificial synthesis. I mean that in the best possible way, but it borrows from everyone: Kralori tea, Dara Happan beards, Carmanian sorcery, even from the Orlanthi of the south, I'm sure, there are at least fashionable barbarisms to be had beyond simply gladiatorial styles. 

[SDLeary]

1 hour ago, Atgxtg said:

The adopt the people, but I don't see the Lunars riding sables. But then Rome started out as a city-state that expanded and merged with it's neighbors. The Lunar Empire was probably larger and with more of it's culture worked out. 

Lunars are a confederation focused on a common religion. If you ask a common man, he will not say he's a Lunar, and probably a noble wouldn't identify that way either. They are going to be Pelorian, Dara Happan, Tarshite, etc.

SDLeary 

[Atgxtg]

2 hours ago, SDLeary said:

Lunars are a confederation focused on a common religion. If you ask a common man, he will not say he's a Lunar, and probably a noble wouldn't identify that way either. They are going to be Pelorian, Dara Happan, Tarshite, etc.

SDLeary 

Yeah. It's a relious pantheon that happens to be an empire. 

[Joerg]

3 hours ago, Atgxtg said:

Going back to Glorantha, I think that might be one the the differences between the Lunar Empire and Rome. The Lunars don't seem to adopt as much from other coutures. 

Militarily, there is no comparison. The Romans perfected their militia, the legion, to maximum efficiency, and stuck to it as the backbone of their force. The Lunars have oodles of units of disparate origin, with disparate equipment and traditions.

The Dara Happan muster has always had five different types of forces, Dara Happans proper and northwesterners, southwesterners, northeasterners and southeasterners. The exact directional forces did vary, but that fact sort of remained.

The Stonewall phalanxes.have become the Southwestern direction, whereas cavalry has superseded avilry, both from the northeast. Even the stodgy Dara Happans did let their lesser folk go with the times.

There are a few Lunar units in the Lunar Empire, e.g. the Dragoons - fervent followers of the Lunar Way who "inherited" Carmanian phalangite armor and horses after the First Battle of Chaos and applied them to their new style of mobile infantry/medium cavalry. The Steel Sword Legion might be another new application of Carmanian equipment, possibly taking cavalry armor and weaponry and making it an (effective) bodyguard and infantry unit.

Carmania, the source of much of the immediate Lunar gear, is of course a fusion of Second Age Fronelan and Pelandan gear, with a fair bit of Bull Folk gear thrown in (though no more bull riders, sadly - though possibly the occasional bull-drawn chariot for some of their priesthood).

The Seleric occupation may have brought in Kralori styles not so much in military gear as in civilian clothing, and ironically more likely to have been adopted by Lunar than by Dara Happan nobility.I wonder how many martial arts (as in weapon mastery of unusual weapons more than in unarmed styles) has survived from the Seleric incursion. While it would be a huge logistical feat to march regular Kralori foot through hundreds of miles of rather dry grassland, making this effort to import elite units made up from martial artists that would double as bodyguards of the bureaucrats imported would be a lot more manageable.

[Steve]

Argh! I was already bummed about missing Dragonmeet for the second year in a row, due to other commitments, but now I find out that I'm going to miss the chance to thumb through your magnum opus, Martin. Argh!

 

[M Helsdon]

12 hours ago, Atgxtg said:

Going back to Glorantha, I think that might be one the the differenes between the Lunar Empire and Rome. The Lunars don't seem to adopt as much from other coutures. 

The Lunars adopt entire regiments from other cultures!

The only borrowing we know of which canonical is the kopis sword from the nomads. Anything else is baseless speculation.

 

[M Helsdon]

2 hours ago, Steve said:

Argh! I was already bummed about missing Dragonmeet for the second year in a row, due to other commitments, but now I find out that I'm going to miss the chance to thumb through your magnum opus, Martin. Argh!

 

UPS stay they've left the package in a local off license... Hopefully I'll be able to collect them today or tomorrow and find out what the printer made of it. I already know of two typos (always seems to happen).

I've decided to take a break from drawing more sketches - the fine work with a 0.1mm pen has done my eyes no favours. Was using a Rotring for the first eight but discovered a Mitsubushi pen gave not only finer lines, but better control. Rotrings were always the best pens back when I was drawing in the 70s/80s, but they've obviously been hit hard by CAD and their quality has diminished.

Edited November 29, 2018 by M Helsdon

[JonL]

44 minutes ago, M Helsdon said:

I've decided to take a break from drawing more sketches - the fine work with a 0.1mm pen has done my eyes no favours. 

I've taken to keeping some much-stronger-than-even-my-middle-aged-eyes-really-need reading glasses around for doing fine-detail tasks; soldiering, sewing, fixing broken jewelry, painting minis, checking the kids for lice, etc. It's like the magnifier on a set of helping hands, but moves with my head.

[Sir_Godspeed]

8 hours ago, Joerg said:

Militarily, there is no comparison. The Romans perfected their militia, the legion, to maximum efficiency, and stuck to it as the backbone of their force. The Lunars have oodles of units of disparate origin, with disparate equipment and traditions.

The Dara Happan muster has always had five different types of forces, Dara Happans proper and northwesterners, southwesterners, northeasterners and southeasterners. The exact directional forces did vary, but that fact sort of remained.

The Stonewall phalanxes.have become the Southwestern direction, whereas cavalry has superseded avilry, both from the northeast. Even the stodgy Dara Happans did let their lesser folk go with the times.

There are a few Lunar units in the Lunar Empire, e.g. the Dragoons - fervent followers of the Lunar Way who "inherited" Carmanian phalangite armor and horses after the First Battle of Chaos and applied them to their new style of mobile infantry/medium cavalry. The Steel Sword Legion might be another new application of Carmanian equipment, possibly taking cavalry armor and weaponry and making it an (effective) bodyguard and infantry unit.

Carmania, the source of much of the immediate Lunar gear, is of course a fusion of Second Age Fronelan and Pelandan gear, with a fair bit of Bull Folk gear thrown in (though no more bull riders, sadly - though possibly the occasional bull-drawn chariot for some of their priesthood).

The Seleric occupation may have brought in Kralori styles not so much in military gear as in civilian clothing, and ironically more likely to have been adopted by Lunar than by Dara Happan nobility.I wonder how many martial arts (as in weapon mastery of unusual weapons more than in unarmed styles) has survived from the Seleric incursion. While it would be a huge logistical feat to march regular Kralori foot through hundreds of miles of rather dry grassland, making this effort to import elite units made up from martial artists that would double as bodyguards of the bureaucrats imported would be a lot more manageable.

This also relates to how "conservative" many Gloranthan cultures may seem to us - certain arrangements of troop types, equipment and tactics play into religious rituals or spells, which genuinely give measurable results. Deviating from that for questionable improvements may not appear to be worth it.

[Atgxtg]

1 hour ago, M Helsdon said:

I've decided to take a break from drawing more sketches - the fine work with a 0.1mm pen has done my eyes no favours. Was using a Rotring for the first eight but discovered a Mitsubushi pen gave not only finer lines, but better control. Rotrings were always the best pens back when I was drawing in the 70s/80s, but they've obviously been hit hard by CAD and their quality has diminished.

Plus the fact that a lot of artists now work in pencil, scan it, and then finish it digitally on a computer. These days the brush pens are probably the best pens, but are harder to master. For 0.1mm I use a Sharpie of all things (not too bad, considering) and a Kuretake brush pen thingy that behaves like a felt tip. I've got a Pentel Brush Pen which is fantastic, but I lack the control to use it reliably. 

But try the Kuretake. It's fairly cheap but sort of the best of two works. It can work like a felt tip, but lay down a heavier line when required.

[M Helsdon]

On ‎11‎/‎29‎/‎2018 at 4:17 PM, Atgxtg said:

Plus the fact that a lot of artists now work in pencil, scan it, and then finish it digitally on a computer. These days the brush pens are probably the best pens, but are harder to master. For 0.1mm I use a Sharpie of all things (not too bad, considering) and a Kuretake brush pen thingy that behaves like a felt tip. I've got a Pentel Brush Pen which is fantastic, but I lack the control to use it reliably. 

But try the Kuretake. It's fairly cheap but sort of the best of two works. It can work like a felt tip, but lay down a heavier line when required.

Will look out for it.

Hardcopies are now in my hands... and as is the way of things, have spotted four formatting errors/typos. There will be more...

[Cover not final.]

 

 

 

 

Edited December 16, 2018 by M Helsdon

[M Helsdon]

4 hours ago, Sir_Godspeed said:

This also relates to how "conservative" many Gloranthan cultures may seem to us - certain arrangements of troop types, equipment and tactics play into religious rituals or spells, which genuinely give measurable results. Deviating from that for questionable improvements may not appear to be worth it.

Which is covered in my book...

Just realized that the adoption of certain weapons & armor, and styles of fighting is also mentioned, but only in passing.

5 hours ago, JonL said:

I've taken to keeping some much-stronger-than-even-my-middle-aged-eyes-really-need reading glasses around for doing fine-detail tasks; soldiering, sewing, fixing broken jewelry, painting minis, checking the kids for lice, etc. It's like the magnifier on a set of helping hands, but moves with my head.

Useful tip.

[soltakss]

17 minutes ago, M Helsdon said:

Will look out for it.

Hardcopies are now in my hands... and as is the way of things, have spotted four formatting errors/typos. There will be more...

[Cover not final.]

 

That's a big book.

Make sure you wave it about at Dragonmeet - Would love to have a look.

[M Helsdon]

16 minutes ago, soltakss said:

That's a big book.

Too big, which is why I am now concentrating on filling up empty space. The appendices and index (which is about 14 pages) could be ejected.

17 minutes ago, soltakss said:

Make sure you wave it about at Dragonmeet - Would love to have a look.

Will have to ask Jeff if I can.

[Atgxtg]

Nice. I'm drooling all over my keyboard. 

[Sir_Godspeed]

2 hours ago, M Helsdon said:

Will look out for it.

Hardcopies are now in my hands... and as is the way of things, have spotted four formatting errors/typos. There will be more...

[Cover not final.]

Holey moley, that's amazing!

[Jon Hunter]

Looks very nice martin.

[Steve]

14 hours ago, soltakss said:

That's a big book.

Make sure you wave it about at Dragonmeet - Would love to have a look.

*remembers that he won't be at Dragonmeet*

*cries*

 

[drablak]

18 hours ago, M Helsdon said:

Hardcopies are now in my hands

Wow this looks fantastic! I sure hope it get published, I certainly would love to get my hands on it. Very impressive work. It looks like a lot of hard work and passion went into it.

[soltakss]

20 hours ago, M Helsdon said:

Will have to ask Jeff if I can.

Jeff's a pussycat really, I'm sure he won't mind.

[womble]

3 hours ago, drablak said:

Wow this looks fantastic! I sure hope it get published, I certainly would love to get my hands on it. Very impressive work. It looks like a lot of hard work and passion went into it.

Absolutely agree.