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The Pavis Plan


David Scott

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24 minutes ago, Darius West said:

Pavis is one of the very few people of the Second Age to become a deity

I'm not so sure that he is, in fact, a deity. In P:GtA, the cult provides no rune magic. I think he is still a mortal, biding his time inside his pretty pink stasis chamber. 

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1 hour ago, Darius West said:

Without a doubt, what you have correctly indicated is the public face of the Pavis Cult as per the write-up.  Locating descendents of Pavis is a great hook for a campaign too.  But what will they look like?

Consider if you will, that (strangely enough) Pavis is one of the very few people of the Second Age to become a deity.  Every age has a couple it seems.

The number is a bit higher if you count successful draconic mystics achieving dragonhood.

1 hour ago, Darius West said:

Interestingly, Pavis doesn't really become a deity until after his city is destroyed.

Do you mean the attack by Thog, which is repelled only after a year? Pavis chose to retreat from mundane life after much of his work was done, in 860. Thog arrived at Pavis ten years later for the first time. What do you mean by "really become a deity"?

1 hour ago, Darius West said:

 Pavis was, after all, a robber of cradles a la the God Learners despite being trained as a EWF mystic.

The device on Cradlecatch Island is credited to Pavis, but I doubt that he had anything to do with it. He had the bridge across the Zola Fel built to a size that allowed the Cradles to pass through - while this definitely was a demand by the Zola Fel cult to allow the bridge at all, he wouldn't have led that concession to absurdum.

Personally, I blame the Arrowsmith Dynasty. The Pure Horse Folk have a tradition of anti-giant magics and cooperation with the Jrusteli cradle robbers.

1 hour ago, Darius West said:

Side note:  Very few individuals were both God Learner sorcerers AND Draconic mystics during the Second Age.  

I don't have any evidence that Pavis was a draconic practitioner. Neither do I have any evidence that Pavis was a Malkioni of any kind. He was the result of a group of experimental magicians that was tolerated by the leaders of the EWF, draconic as well as pre-draconic traditionalist ones.

He did have contact to one resident practitioner of a form of sorcery in Dragon Pass: Isidilian, the "Dwarf" of Dwarf Run (actually an original Mostali). I would guess that his sorcery is closer to Mostali sorcery than it is to Malkioni spellcasting.

1 hour ago, Darius West said:

I can think of Pavis and only one other... Delecti.  

I doubt that Pavis was either God Learner or draconic practitioner, and I am fairly certain that while Delecti tolerated the draconic craze of the Heortlings of Dragon Pass, he did not follow their teachings. He may have been a God Learner zzaburi in disgrace.

He wasn't the only sorcerer active in the EWF, though, not by far. The City of 10,000 Magicians in Aggar had a university which taught sorcery in addition to other ways of magic, to almost any comer - even unlikely students like e.g. the Orlanth cult uz hero Hachrat Blowhard from Yolp.

1 hour ago, Darius West said:

Now while Delecti became a hero and survived the Dragonkill, he didn't quite become a deity.  Did he have more sense?  

Delecti didn't quite survive the Dragonkill - his undead status is the reason why he was tolerated during the Inhuman Occupation.

I don't know whether Delecti had more sense - turning yourself into an undead doesn't make much sense to most people.

1 hour ago, Darius West said:

Can it be mere coincidence, then, that the Big Rubble is crawling with Vampires? Blind King's Palace, Balastor's Baracks, etc. 

These powerful undead feel the draw of the special residual magic in the remnants of the Faceless Statue, I suppose. It is true that the Second Age saw the activities of many such powerful undead, but other than Delecti we don't have any time stamp of creation of these entities. They may as well be persisting (not exactly surviving) followers of Nontraya, dispersed after Kimantor and Heort separated the Dead from the Living.

The Puzzle Canal was not constructed by Pavis, but by Labrygon, aka Lorenkarg(at)an, significantly after Pavis retreated.

1 hour ago, Darius West said:

Now the whole New Pavis form of Pavis worship might be the public face of the cult, but it wasn't where the worship started.  It began with Pavis' bloodline, and it was perpetuated in places like Mani Fort, Fort Opili, and other continuously inhabited survivor settlements in the Big Rubble.  

While the Arrowsmith Dynasty can be assumed to carry on Pavis's blood line, I don't think that Mani Fort or Fort Opili have any descendants from one of the other daughters of Pavis. I guess that a significant part of the Pavis Survivors zebra tribe can trace their ancestry to Joraz Khyreen and his companions, and some possibly to other daughters.

1 hour ago, Darius West said:

Then you have the Flintnail cult, which is essentially the Mostali Openhandists kindly adapting their knowledge to what they think a human theist perspective would look like (Remember...Clark Kent is what Superman thinks ordinary people are like... see where I am going?).  Flintnail is essentially a cargo cult invented by the Dwarves to induce human co-operation in a form they can control... but what "masonic secrets" are they really protecting in the city?  Founding a city is normally enough to get someone venerated in Glorantha, but the cult of Pavis seems a little more involved and extreme than your usual "city founder" religion, and the whole mythic landscape of what was being attempted in Old Pavis seems like a major power play that went wrong... (unless it was supposed to go wrong).

The masonic secrets used to transform parts of the Faceless Statue and the slabs planted in the earth by Paragua surpasses anything of dwarfen build in Boldhome, and look how irate the Mostali reacted when Saronil used those meagre technologies to build an urban temple to Orlanth in Boldhome.

Being able to maintain that wall until the support inside its enclosure had dwindled away is a valid use of veneration to power a magical building. IMO the cult of Sartar did something similar for the royal highways.

1 hour ago, Darius West said:

Similarly, Pavis himself was a strange amalgam of races, to the point where he may have actually been a manifestation of a more perfect form of Man Rune, not crippled by the limits of racial purity but unleashed through hybrid vigour.  

I think that was the goal of his parents' secret society, yes.

1 hour ago, Darius West said:

So what form did Pavis worship take in the dark days of the 17 Foes of Waha and before the coming of Dorasar?  It is a known fact that the New Pavis Temple is the public face of the Sartarite attempt to come to terms with this ancient city and its secrets, but how much remains hidden even from them?  After all, these Pavic Sartarites are newcomers in the grand scheme of things and they just aren't ready for the truth...

Heck, not even the Daughters of Pavis as of 1617 are ready for the truth. At least in my personal experience when I embodied Cyrilius Harmonious in the People of Pavis freeform of 1997, at Castle Stahleck.

 

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On 3/15/2017 at 9:45 AM, Joerg said:

I don't have any evidence that Pavis was a draconic practitioner. Neither do I have any evidence that Pavis was a Malkioni of any kind. He was the result of a group of experimental magicians that was tolerated by the leaders of the EWF, draconic as well as pre-draconic traditionalist ones.

Pavis Common knowledge page 6.  Second last paragraph.

"As a young man Pavis escaped the sack of Adari and reached Dragon Pass.  His family had connections there and this bright young man studied the magic of the dragons, as was newly popular there.  He made many friends among important peoples as he progressed in his research."

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The Pavis Box was written long before Greg formulated the mystical approach of the EWF. The current approach is that the early mystical approach means to confront the different magics of animism, theism and materialism, understanding them and (if you are going further on the mystic's path) recognizing their irrelevance in the face of the Absolute.

As a result, sorcery or alchemy (same thing, really) was studied among the Orlanthi inhabiting the EWF, along with the more traditional magics of animism and theism.

This can be done by following the introductory teachings of the draconic practitioners. But as the examples of e.g. Hachrat Blowhard or Varnakol the Mangler show, such a student doesn't have to become a draconic practitioner.

Telling how it is excessive verbis

 

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28 minutes ago, Joerg said:

The Pavis Box was written long before Greg formulated the mystical approach of the EWF. The current approach is that the early mystical approach means to confront the different magics of animism, theism and materialism, understanding them and (if you are going further on the mystic's path) recognizing their irrelevance in the face of the Absolute.

However we didn't edit the same paragraph out of Pavis GTA page 30. But in Pavis GTA there's no indication at all that he used the "magic of the dragons". None of his magics show any sign of Dragon Magic influences. Pavis was an ally of EWF, but not an active participant in their plan. That there is no evidence of Dragon magic in the city is different, it was clearly there from the start with the Guardian of the Left, and also

Quote

the ancient Dragonewt temple, built there during the heyday of the Empire of the Wyrm’s Friends.  

and later the bulk of Draconic involvement coming post-Pavis with the Arrowsmith Dynasty:

Quote

King Hendroste managed to maintain friendship with both the demi-god priests in Dragon Pass and the sorcerous God Learners of the Middle Sea Empire. 

Quote

King Yanas brought the city closer to the demigod-priests of Dragon Pass than it had under any of his ancestors... In 920, King Yanas invited the demigod-priest Labyrgon to reside in Pavis and gave him the Dragon Hill and the lands below it to build Labyrgon’s Puzzle Canal. The king even studied draconic wisdom at the feet of Labyrgon but did not advance far. 

There was also a Dragonewt town built by the looks of it outside the Red Stick circle is a rather odd place (IMHO)

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On 3/15/2017 at 9:45 AM, Joerg said:

The number is a bit higher if you count successful draconic mystics achieving dragonhood.

This is entirely up for debate.  Godlike perhaps, but gods?  Dragons are still able to move in the world in a way that gods can't, ergo, are they bound by the Great Compromise? Given the dragon rise, that seems unlikely.  Ergo, not deities, tougher in some ways, weaker in others.

On 3/15/2017 at 9:45 AM, Joerg said:

 

Do you mean the attack by Thog, which is repelled only after a year? Pavis chose to retreat from mundane life after much of his work was done, in 860. Thog arrived at Pavis ten years later for the first time. What do you mean by "really become a deity"?

No, I don't count that as when Pavis becomes a deity.  Pavis becomes a deity when people start worshiping him and he starts giving them spells in return.  That happens some time after the fall of the city.  Sitting in a pink crystal is probably a factor, but not decisive.

On 3/15/2017 at 9:45 AM, Joerg said:

The device on Cradlecatch Island is credited to Pavis, but I doubt that he had anything to do with it. He had the bridge across the Zola Fel built to a size that allowed the Cradles to pass through - while this definitely was a demand by the Zola Fel cult to allow the bridge at all, he wouldn't have led that concession to absurdum.

Personally, I blame the Arrowsmith Dynasty. The Pure Horse Folk have a tradition of anti-giant magics and cooperation with the Jrusteli cradle robbers.

As there is no specific mention of cradles while Pavis was active and building the city what you wrote is a reasonable conclusion. 

On 3/15/2017 at 9:45 AM, Joerg said:

He did have contact to one resident practitioner of a form of sorcery in Dragon Pass: Isidilian, the "Dwarf" of Dwarf Run (actually an original Mostali). I would guess that his sorcery is closer to Mostali sorcery than it is to Malkioni spellcasting.

We have no written evidence of the connection between Isidilian and Pavis, but it does seem likely.  But then it is only likely, not proven.  Don't be so quick to disparage other likely conclusions.  Pavis made plenty of important friends in the EWF, that is on record.

On 3/15/2017 at 9:45 AM, Joerg said:

I doubt that Pavis was either God Learner or draconic practitioner, and I am fairly certain that while Delecti tolerated the draconic craze of the Heortlings of Dragon Pass, he did not follow their teachings. He may have been a God Learner zzaburi in disgrace.

We have conclusive proof that Pavis was a draconic practitioner.  As to him being or not being a god learner...  Pavis did essentially rebuild Robcradle, and his followers subsequently started breaking cradles.  Also, Pavis is a sorcerer.  Godlearner is as Godlearner does.

On 3/15/2017 at 9:45 AM, Joerg said:

The Puzzle Canal was not constructed by Pavis, but by Labrygon, aka Lorenkarg(at)an, significantly after Pavis retreated.

True.  But is it done with Pavis' connivance or not?  We simply cannot know, but it seems unlikely that a major construction would take place without Pavis' blessing.  he is, after all, only retired, not dead.  Clearly the Sacred Time link to the Styx is what is important.

On 3/15/2017 at 9:45 AM, Joerg said:

While the Arrowsmith Dynasty can be assumed to carry on Pavis's blood line, I don't think that Mani Fort or Fort Opili have any descendants from one of the other daughters of Pavis. I guess that a significant part of the Pavis Survivors zebra tribe can trace their ancestry to Joraz Khyreen and his companions, and some possibly to other daughters.

Yes, but they don't have a breeding population of sufficient size to remove the risk of inbreeding.  In essence they would need to have a commerce in bloodlines with the other human forts to avoid endogamy.  Ergo, any legitimate Pavis blood is likey spread quite widely by now in the general Rubble human community, all things considered.

On 3/15/2017 at 9:45 AM, Joerg said:

The masonic secrets used to transform parts of the Faceless Statue and the slabs planted in the earth by Paragua surpasses anything of dwarfen build in Boldhome, and look how irate the Mostali reacted when Saronil used those meagre technologies to build an urban temple to Orlanth in Boldhome.

Being able to maintain that wall until the support inside its enclosure had dwindled away is a valid use of veneration to power a magical building. IMO the cult of Sartar did something similar for the royal highways.

The suggestion is that what Pavis did met with substantial Mostali consent, in a way that building a temple to a hostile God (Orlanth) with Mostali magic probably didn't.  Pavis was a great builder of consensus, much like Sartar, and unlike Saronil.  Using Mostali slaves for construction work was an old Orlanthi tradition, and I bet it was, and remains, a slap in the face to the Mostali to do that to them.

As to the highway building hypothesis, sure, why not?

On 3/15/2017 at 9:45 AM, Joerg said:

I think that was the goal of his parents' secret society, yes.

Aye, there's the rub.  The true perpertrators remain as faceless as the statue that built the city.  Who are these influential Adari folk with friends in the EWF who send their refugee son to Dragon Pass where he hobnobs with the big wigs, raising the magical and financial capital to build a city in the wastes of Prax?  One an elf, one a human?  Does Pavis still have living relatives in Adari?  Part troll part dwarf relatives?  

And then there is the true mystery... Given what a s**thole Adari is, how could anyone tell it had been sacked?  I mean when burglars rob a really messy apartment, it is often days before the residents notice things missing.  And what is the difference between the sack of Adari and a usual Darkday's afternoon hard drinking at the nearest trollish "establishment"?  Blood in the streets, people missing and presumed eaten, things stolen and houses set abalze?  Sounds like the home team lost at Trollball again.   

On 3/15/2017 at 9:45 AM, Joerg said:

Heck, not even the Daughters of Pavis as of 1617 are ready for the truth. At least in my personal experience when I embodied Cyrilius Harmonious in the People of Pavis freeform of 1997, at Castle Stahleck.

Yes, that was my point...  I don't think the current Sartarite Daughters of Pavis are really the heirs of the secrets, I think they are chasing whatever crumbs they can find, and half the pleasure of the religion is in piecing the clues together like archaeologists.  If your impression of the Daughters of Pavis in the Freeform was that they weren't ready to face secrets about their religion and its founders because it is confronting, and maybe not the image they want to present to the world, what are they going to do about it?  The simple answer is "hush it up".

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1 hour ago, Joerg said:

The Pavis Box was written long before Greg formulated the mystical approach of the EWF. The current approach is that the early mystical approach means to confront the different magics of animism, theism and materialism, understanding them and (if you are going further on the mystic's path) recognizing their irrelevance in the face of the Absolute.

As a result, sorcery or alchemy (same thing, really) was studied among the Orlanthi inhabiting the EWF, along with the more traditional magics of animism and theism.

This can be done by following the introductory teachings of the draconic practitioners. But as the examples of e.g. Hachrat Blowhard or Varnakol the Mangler show, such a student doesn't have to become a draconic practitioner.

Pavis Common Knowledge still remains canon, and therefore irrefutable scripture which you and all supplicants must bow before, according to the guardians of Gloranthan Orthodoxy, that Pavis was an initiate of the draconic mysteries according to the history.  He was also in the privileged position of being one of the few people who seems to have cracked the impasse between sorcery and draconic magic.  This was something the Godlearners apparently never achieved, or they could simply have subsumed the EWF.  Of course in game terms it is uncertain whether that gets you a long way ahead.  Speaking from a pure power game perspective for a moment, a more dedicated specialization towards a single tradition nets you more power in most instances.  

As to whether sorcery and alchemy are the same thing... I can't agree.  Related and of a similar origin certainly, but not the same thing.  As a point in case, you can most definitely be an alchemist but not a sorceror and a sorceror but not an alchemist; they are just skills, and not the same skill.

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8 minutes ago, Darius West said:

 that Pavis was an initiate of the draconic mysteries according to the history.  He was also in the privileged position of be

It doesn't say he was an initiate of draconic mysteries, it says he studied the magic of the dragons. Just what the magic of the dragons he studied isn't defined. His cult offers no magics that could be called even remotely magic of the dragons. He's even slightly at odds with the progenitors of the beast rune, going down a singular man rune route. I suspect that if his cult had any dragon leanings, it would of been purged in the backlash at the downfall of EWF and the god learners. Oddly Pavis the city was untouched. 

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3 hours ago, Darius West said:

bound by the Great Compromise? Given the dragon rise, that seems unlikely

Compromise was already broken by the time of the Dragonrise, so that doesn't prove whether they can or cannot act outside of the Compromise.  I think more likely they must commit utuma to move outside of Time and the Compromise.

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5 hours ago, Joerg said:

The Pavis Box was written long before Greg formulated the mystical approach of the EWF.

I find this unlikely given that mysticism appears in Cults of Terror with statements like

Quote

The mystics claim
that the dragon-powers manifested themselves in the void by
becoming committed and entangled with the world which was
yet to come, and in those actions created the barrier shimmering
between the perfect void and our understanding of it.

Cults of Terror p11

 

5 hours ago, Joerg said:

The current approach is that the early mystical approach means to confront the different magics of animism, theism and materialism, understanding them and (if you are going further on the mystic's path) recognizing their irrelevance in the face of the Absolute.

I don't think that to be a mystic one has to understand and refute the three different magics.  One can be a mystic by follow one magical tradition (be it animism, sorcery or rune magics) and use it to improve the self without ever being exposed to another magical tradition.  The key criteria is whether the magic improves the soul.  

 

5 hours ago, Joerg said:

As a result, sorcery or alchemy (same thing, really) was studied among the Orlanthi inhabiting the EWF, along with the more traditional magics of animism and theism.

The Orlanthi knew of sorcery as far back as the Storm Age from Lhankor Mhy.  It may not have been as advanced as in the western lands but it was still there.  

 

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6 hours ago, jajagappa said:

Compromise was already broken by the time of the Dragonrise, so that doesn't prove whether they can or cannot act outside of the Compromise.  I think more likely they must commit utuma to move outside of Time and the Compromise.

So what broke the compromise?  The "deaths" of Orlanth and Ernalda?  Because they got better...  My point is that unlike gods, dragons are able to intervene directly in the world by roasting and eating whole armies e.g. the Dragonkill, and that happens within the Compromise.  Gods are bound by the compromise and can't intervene in that way because they are essentially static.  Lets face facts, Dragons are pretty static too most of the time, but as history attests, they retain the power to ACT.

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1 hour ago, Darius West said:

So what broke the compromise?  The "deaths" of Orlanth and Ernalda?  Because they got better...  My point is that unlike gods, dragons are able to intervene directly in the world by roasting and eating whole armies e.g. the Dragonkill, and that happens within the Compromise.  Gods are bound by the compromise and can't intervene in that way because they are essentially static.  Lets face facts, Dragons are pretty static too most of the time, but as history attests, they retain the power to ACT.

Hard to say, really. The compromise was broken in 1247 with the rise of the Red Moon, some people may say, or with the Battle of Castle Blue.

Others might cite the Syndics' Ban.

The Night of Horrors was a localized breach of the Compromise, too, although neither side was a subscriber to the concept.

Harrek slaying and skinning the Polar Bear God certainly didn't strengthen the Compromise. Nor did his subsequent struggle with Belintar, or Jar-eel's intervention there.

The Fall of Whitewall broke the Compromise at least for the affected area, and the Dragonrise was in all likelihood fuelled by this (and possibly the added breach of Compromise that is the Glowline).

Orlanth and Ernalda got better, but at least Orlanth didn't get fully well again until the destruction of the temple in the Dragonrise.

 

Dragons retain the power to act, same as dragonewts, and they usually are reluctant to do so, possibly for similar motivations. They aren't fully ascended beings, still lingering in the material world. Most of the time they hold back their true power, too - the release of the dragon in the Dragonrise was of a much larger scale than the arrival of the Green Dragon near Arrowmound a few centuries earlier. It was observable from the most distant corners of Glorantha, as it included a celestial event, the reunion of the Sky Dragon and the summoned dragon flying up to meet with this phenomenon. And yes, the summoned dragon flying upwars was visible all over Glorantha, maybe not quite as large as Rufelza's orb in the sky, but big enough to blot out way more than only one star at a time. The very earth was trembling. Quite possibly the sky was, too.

I had the chance to play the Dragonrise as a scenario once, and it truly was one of the most memorable of my Glorantha gaming experiences.

 

Edited by Joerg
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Getting back to Lord Pavis' plan -- 

We still don't know what Pavis was/is up to, but it seems likely that it is connected to the Man rune. We can further assume that Ginkizzie, the human-aldryami-mostali hybrid, and the cult of Flintnail, is the lynchpin of it. Ginkizzie has been there since the beginning, occupied with maintaining and, later on, repairing the magical geometry/architecture/sigil of the City. The cult of Flintnail holds rank over the cult of Pavis -- Flintnail leaders have seats in the leadership of the Pavis cult, but the reverse is not true. So, I'd say the cult of Flintnail is there to carry out the plan, and the cult of Pavis is there to supplement the cult of Flintnail.  

Whatever Pavis' plan is, it involves whatever Power is hidden at/under what is now the Cacodemon temple -- the Red Stick Circle is centred on it, with the maximal radius allowed by Paragua's walls. I also note that Pavis very deliberately let the Faceless Statue fall to precisely place its head, his future Villa, right on the circle. My take is that the Cacodemon temple is the place where the Eye of Wakboth landed and that it is the birthplace of Cacodemon and the race of ogres. I imagine the Godlearners of Feroda built Robcradle when they discovered the Power there, and Tapped it for their own ungodly ends. I don't doubt that Pavis saw a walled-in place of Power as a ready-made site for his experiment -- or he formulated his experiment based on that very resource.

A very real possibility, as noted up-thread, is that Lord Pavis was the Muad'dib to some EWF Bene Gesserit Man rune conspiracy and groomed for this very purpose. Witness the Uz of Dagori Inkarth. Why would they send a non-negligible portion of their population, supported by heavy magics, to a ruined city in the middle of nowhere? What great rewards could the ragged human survivors possibly promise them that could justify that move? Was it the case that Jarkanita Ab or her underlings was aware of the Man rune conspiracy, having opted out of it when it was proposed to her by the conspirators (they obviously already had humans, aldryami, and mostali in on it), and then saw the chance to seize the experiment for herself when asked for aid by the survivors? 

EDIT: One of Jarkanita Ab's main concerns is breaking the Trollkin Curse -- having the Original Man available is likely to be a major boon to that project.  Given that nothing of importance has been reported on either side since the troll invasion of Pavis except for sporadic violence means that neither the Flintnailers nor the trolls have met with any noticeable success.  

 

 

 

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Is it still the case that Mostali are not descended from Grandfather Mortal? I guess that doe not preclude them having a strong tie to the man rune (if it walks like a duck and cusses like a duck etc.).

Mostali used to decry how rock had lost it's life force since time began, saying that god-time rock was more like truestone. did Flintnail already have all command of the processes to animate a faceless stone statue or did he collaborate with Man-rune specialist Lord Pavis to (re)awaken life in some stone as an experiment towards accelerating ultimate world machine repair?

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3 hours ago, Darius West said:

The "deaths" of Orlanth and Ernalda?  Because they got better...

I'm unsure they got better, I think they were transformed into something newer by the Heroquesters - Orlanth has more stars etc. @Ian Cooper may have more on this.

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4 hours ago, Darius West said:

So what broke the compromise?  The "deaths" of Orlanth and Ernalda?

Not the 'deaths' but the imprisoning of those two in the Underworld.

As noted in the Glorantha Sourcebook p.98-99: The Hero Wars have already started in Dragon Pass. The Lunar Empire conquered Dragon Pass and used incredible magic to imprison the gods Orlanth and Ernalda in the Underworld despite the Compromise. The Cosmos shuddered and shook, and many fear the Cosmic Compromise, long frayed, has been torn asunder.

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2 hours ago, Byll said:

Mostali used to decry how rock had lost it's life force since time began, saying that god-time rock was more like truestone. did Flintnail already have all command of the processes to animate a faceless stone statue or did he collaborate with Man-rune specialist Lord Pavis to (re)awaken life in some stone as an experiment towards accelerating ultimate world machine repair?

This is interesting. Was Flintnail's payoff for his participation in the Pavis project/conspiracy simply proof-on-concept methodology on reanimating stone? He vanished fairly quickly after helping Pavis set up his thing within Paragua's walls, after all. 

By the by, is Flintnail the same mostali as Isidilian? Or are they two different individuals? I haven't found any source that states this unequivocally. 

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23 minutes ago, mikkling said:

This is interesting. Was Flintnail's payoff for his participation in the Pavis project/conspiracy simply proof-on-concept methodology on reanimating stone? He vanished fairly quickly after helping Pavis set up his thing within Paragua's walls, after all. 

By the by, is Flintnail the same mostali as Isidilian? Or are they two different individuals? I haven't found any source that states this unequivocally. 

One of the Octamony Mostali types (lead?) can animate Jonanti from carved rock, but maybe Flintnail was hoping for improvements to the techniques by working with Pavis.

I think it's unconfirmed whether Flintnail is an avatar/relative of Isidilian or not. I think the rumour that the two might be the same/connected was official, but I'm not sure

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5 hours ago, mikkling said:

...  Given that nothing of importance has been reported on either side since the troll invasion of Pavis except for sporadic violence means that neither the Flintnailers nor the trolls have met with any noticeable success.  

Errrr ... no (ygmv)

That "... nothing of importance has been reported..." just means that nothing has been reported... not that nothing important has happened.

The Mostali have never been exactly forthcoming and transparent with their secrets, have they?  And similarly, the Dark Folk are DARK, remember, and part of the fundamental nature of the Darkness is that it conceals -- what's outside the light isn't known to the light.

I reiterate, however:  YGMV.

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16 hours ago, Joerg said:

Hard to say, really. The compromise was broken in 1247 with the rise of the Red Moon, some people may say, or with the Battle of Castle Blue.

Others might cite the Syndics' Ban.

The Night of Horrors was a localized breach of the Compromise, too, although neither side was a subscriber to the concept.

Harrek slaying and skinning the Polar Bear God certainly didn't strengthen the Compromise. Nor did his subsequent struggle with Belintar, or Jar-eel's intervention there.

The Fall of Whitewall broke the Compromise at least for the affected area, and the Dragonrise was in all likelihood fuelled by this (and possibly the added breach of Compromise that is the Glowline).

Orlanth and Ernalda got better, but at least Orlanth didn't get fully well again until the destruction of the temple in the Dragonrise.

 

Dragons retain the power to act, same as dragonewts, and they usually are reluctant to do so, possibly for similar motivations. They aren't fully ascended beings, still lingering in the material world. Most of the time they hold back their true power, too - the release of the dragon in the Dragonrise was of a much larger scale than the arrival of the Green Dragon near Arrowmound a few centuries earlier. It was observable from the most distant corners of Glorantha, as it included a celestial event, the reunion of the Sky Dragon and the summoned dragon flying up to meet with this phenomenon. And yes, the summoned dragon flying upwars was visible all over Glorantha, maybe not quite as large as Rufelza's orb in the sky, but big enough to blot out way more than only one star at a time. The very earth was trembling. Quite possibly the sky was, too.

I had the chance to play the Dragonrise as a scenario once, and it truly was one of the most memorable of my Glorantha gaming experiences.

 

So the question is really more about what the Great Compromise really is?  I suspect it is more like a legal code for deities than anything else.  The notion being that the Gods agree not to intervene directly in Glorantha unless certain conditions are broken.  

I don't see the Syndics Ban as breaching the compromise.  It was a band-aid used to patch up the damage done by the God Learners, and in most ways it was there to support the Compromise imo.  A bit like a ring judge calling fighters to return to their corners while the mat is fixed.

The rise of the Red Goddess is an interesting case, for while it broke the compromise enough for certain forces to awaken and do battle at Castle Blue, there was a good case to be made that she was a god before time and thus had a right to exist, even though she didn't swear to the compromise back before time... or did she?  She is after all depicted on the Gods Wall.

Harrek killing a deity and subsuming its power constitutes a loophole.  Mortals shouldn't theoretically be capable of such a thing, so it is a loophole left open by divine arrogance.  By taking up the mantle of the Polar Bear God however Harrek did not actually kill it, and now he is a mortal with divine power able to act outside the compromise. 

Killing deities or making new ones is the big breach.  I don't know how important that is in the case of Belintar who is basically a body thief.

As for the Night of Horrors, the compromise was mainly broken by the chaotic forces unleashed there.

So do we see any breach of the compromise as a "destruction of the compromise" or is it more like "breaking the law"?  Of course if an area of lawlessness continues to exist there is a problem...

Edited by Darius West
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On 3/21/2017 at 2:26 AM, Darius West said:

So the question is really more about what the Great Compromise really is?  I suspect it is more like a legal code for deities than anything else.  The notion being that the Gods agree not to intervene directly in Glorantha unless certain conditions are broken.  

I don't see the Syndics Ban as breaching the compromise.  It was a band-aid used to patch up the damage done by the God Learners, and in most ways it was there to support the Compromise imo.  A bit like a ring judge calling fighters to return to their corners while the mat is fixed.

The rise of the Red Goddess is an interesting case, for while it broke the compromise enough for certain forces to awaken and do battle at Castle Blue, there was a good case to be made that she was a god before time and thus had a right to exist, even though she didn't swear to the compromise back before time... or did she?  She is after all depicted on the Gods Wall.

 

I agree, not everything that changes Glorantha breaks the Compromise. The Red Goddess proved herself part of the Compromise at Castle Blue. The Syndics Ban doesn't break the Compromise as, although it kills a god, it is a minor god and hence does not upset the Compromise.

 

Harrek killing a deity and subsuming its power constitutes a loophole.  Mortals shouldn't theoretically be capable of such a thing, so it is a loophole left open by divine arrogance.  By taking up the mantle of the Polar Bear God however Harrek did not actually kill it, and now he is a mortal with divine power able to act outside the compromise. 

Oh, I think he killed it, but it was a very minor god and so doesn't matter.

 

Killing deities or making new ones is the big breach.  I don't know how important that is in the case of Belintar who is basically a body thief.

Heroes become deities all the time. Pavis, The Seven Mothers, The Red Goddess, Sartar, all became deities and none broke the Compromise.

Deities can be killed, in my opinion. Belintar killed the Only Old One and that did not break the Compromise.

As for the Night of Horrors, the compromise was mainly broken by the chaotic forces unleashed there.

The Night of Horrors is an interesting one, as it definitely broke the fabric on time and space. However, I don't think it broke the Compromise as such. Sure, it rained down heroes, demigods and so on, but in a very localised fashion.

 

So do we see any breach of the compromise as a "destruction of the compromise" or is it more like "breaking the law"?  Of course if an area of lawlessness continues to exist there is a problem...

I think the slaying/binding of Orlanth and Ernalda broke the Compromise, as they are King and Queen of the Gods. Voria appears after this act and goddesses like Voria don't appear unless the Compromise is broken. Sure, they get better, but once broken the Compromise stays broken until mended. The Hero Wars, in my opinion, is the mending of the Compromise, ending with the tearing down of the Red Moon. 

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On 3/20/2017 at 10:31 AM, David Scott said:

It doesn't say he was an initiate of draconic mysteries, it says he studied the magic of the dragons. Just what the magic of the dragons he studied isn't defined. His cult offers no magics that could be called even remotely magic of the dragons. He's even slightly at odds with the progenitors of the beast rune, going down a singular man rune route. I suspect that if his cult had any dragon leanings, it would of been purged in the backlash at the downfall of EWF and the god learners. Oddly Pavis the city was untouched. 

So you are suggesting that Pavis was merely an observer of the various EWF rituals?  More or less like a Lhankor Mhy proto-anthropological study of the draconic mysteries?  An interesting supposition.  Are you suggesting that Pavis was an LM initiate?  That would explain the links to alchemy and sorcery

Also, I don't see how being on a man rune path makes one at odds with beast runes. Admittedly Waha has a beast rune, but that is a totally different issue.

Consider, Daka Fal has a man rune and most of its adherents are baboons; Kyger Litor has a man rune and most of her adherents look more like baboons than humans;  Now look at the plethora of cults that have no man rune but are all but exclusively populated by humans.  It looks to me like the man rune is more of an indication that a cult is a bit insecure about being considered "people".  It sort of makes you question Pavis' very mysterious parentage even more when you think about it like that. It isn't like Aldrya has a man rune after all... Say... wait a minute... how often did Pavis shave? 🤔 

This does rather beg the question of what cults or traditions Pavis was actually an initiate of.  That would answer quite a lot.  As nothing is formally recorded on the subject other than a connection to Mostal and the EWF draconic tradition we have little factual information to go on other than supposition.

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33 minutes ago, Darius West said:

So you are suggesting that Pavis was merely an observer of the various EWF rituals?

No. I'm just saying It doesn't say he was an initiate of draconic mysteries and that his cult has no draconic connection.

33 minutes ago, Darius West said:

Also, I don't see how being on a man rune path makes one at odds with beast runes.

If you are trying to embody a particular rune, then other competing runes should likely be suppressed. As Gloranthans are made up of all runes, there's undoubtably a bit of beast rune in there that needs suppressing.

33 minutes ago, Darius West said:

This does rather beg the question of what cults or traditions Pavis was actually an initiate of.  That would answer quite a lot.  As nothing is formally recorded on the subject other than a connection to Mostal and the EWF draconic tradition we have little factual information to go on other than supposition.

It seems likely that he was part of some kind of sorcerous school. Given he lived in Adari, which was just outside of the EWF (see the Historical maps in the Guide), it would suggest either that the group he was part of needed to be somewhere outside of the influence of the EWF or that Adari offered something that helped in the project (or both). Then once sacked he went to the EWF in Dragon Pass through family connections.

The sidebar on p361 of Pavis GtA, implies that the experiment he was part of was part of the EWF:

Quote

Pavis was indicative of the sort of strange magical experimentation that took place during the rule of Third Council. Pavis’ birth was miraculous and heralded a return to the unity that had once existed amongst all mortal races in the Gods Age. Many EWF fervently hoped that Pavis would become the sire of the Original Man, a being that unite all mortals. Unfortunately, the experiment failed, but the city Pavis founded remained. 

likewise the box on p367:

Quote

Pavis is not a god that you can gain magic from by emulating. He is not a cosmic god or even a personal one; his cult is merely the social glue that holds the people of his city together. However, Pavis himself was a magically powerful magician attempting a Great Experiment with the support of the Third Council. His city was a sideline to that goal; a place where the Great Experiment could take place.

With proper study, Lord Pavis’ writings and teachings do provide form of spells. Correctly reciting the formulae from these texts produces a known effect. However, Lord Pavis’ wizardry has little if anything to do with the wizards of the west who venerate the sacred texts of Malkion. Even though Lord Pavis’ magic works identically to western sorcery under the rules, very few Gloranthans would think Pavis is anything other than a theist cult.

A Malkioni sorcerer capable of reading Auld Wyrmish the Pavic grimoires to be nothing more than blasphemous and abhorrent sorcery. Similarly, a Pavic cultist capable of reading the Abiding Book of the Malkioni would be similarly appalled. 

Pavis doesn't appear to have crafted any draconic grimoires.

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Sure, Pavis doesn't have any draconic powers.

But the Sun Dragon cult is present in the Big Rubble, the Dragonewt Dream specifically smashed the leaden seals on Wyvern Gate and entered the Big Rubble (something that, to me knowledge, they didn't do elsewhere) and dragonewts set up a dragonewt temple in the Big Rubble. So, there is definitely something important, from a draconic point of view, in the Big Rubble.

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