Jump to content

Bits of Glorantha you ignore


Jon Hunter

Recommended Posts

1 hour ago, pachristian said:

In ancient times...

The original "Greyhawk" book (TSR 1975) had a pumpkin-headed creature with glowing eyes at the back of the book. Nobody could figure out what it was. But it apparently made it's way into the original RQ.

b8858a450ecc01f0422bc5bff01562d1.jpg

Quote

“Bugbear, Ghoul and Friends” by Greg Bell, from Dungeons & Dragons Supplement I: Greyhawk, written by Gary Gygax and Rob Kuntz, TSR, 1976. Apparently the writers told the illustrator that the bugbear should be big and hairy with a pumpkin-shaped...

from a post on Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.co.uk/pin/497929302534273213/

There's a thread on G+ explaining the link

 

Edited by David Scott
added G+ link
  • Like 3

-----

Search the Glorantha Resource Site: https://wellofdaliath.chaosium.com. Search the Glorantha mailing list archives: https://glorantha.steff.in/digests/

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 10/11/2017 at 8:41 PM, Mark Mohrfield said:

Restricting long bows to only the Rathoreli. It seems to overate both how powerful and how rare the longbow was.

The English/Welsh Longbow was a proven weapon on 15th Century battlefields, yet was never adopted by European countries' armies, who pretty much stuck with 'inferior' crossbows.

(I know that our 15th century is in no way similar to Glorantha's 'bronze-age' tech-level/cultures, but this weapon was historically rare outside of England and Wales so I have no problem with it's rarity within Glorantha.)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

8 hours ago, Brian McReynolds said:

The English/Welsh Longbow was a proven weapon on 15th Century battlefields, yet was never adopted by European countries' armies, who pretty much stuck with 'inferior' crossbows.

(I know that our 15th century is in no way similar to Glorantha's 'bronze-age' tech-level/cultures, but this weapon was historically rare outside of England and Wales so I have no problem with it's rarity within Glorantha.)

Granted that it was rarely used by whole military units. My point was it's use by individuals.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, Mark Mohrfield said:

Granted that it was rarely used by whole military units. My point was it's use by individuals.

But it was still a pretty powerful weapon, able to shoot an are far farther and more accurately than a crossbow. However, you needed biceps of steel in order to draw it properly.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Richard S. said:

But it was still a pretty powerful weapon, able to shoot an are far farther and more accurately than a crossbow. However, you needed biceps of steel in order to draw it properly.

Actually, no. The triceps and the shoulder musculature are what is required to fire a bow.

There were a almost 50 yew longbows in the Nydam Mose finds, which I would expect to have drawn at 80 to 100 lbs at average (28 inch) draw length. If you have a longer draw, draw weight increases quite dramatically - I draw a nominal 55 lbs flatbow to about 75 lbs at 31 inch draw length. Those yew bows are likely to be even less forgiving at longer draws.

It takes two to three days a week training to be able to fire more than two dozen arrows in a span of about as many or less minutes. Military requirement were four dozen arrows, if I am correctly informed.

150 yards range is manageable even in unfavorable winds when firing at units, 70 yards or less when firing at individuals. At lower than 50 yards, contemporary armor gets pierced,

The shields found at Nydam Mose were of soft wood, and rather thin (a quarter inch), designed to capture the arrows and slow them almost like ballistic cloth.

Edited by Joerg
  • Helpful 2

Telling how it is excessive verbis

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

15 hours ago, Richard S. said:

But it was still a pretty powerful weapon, able to shoot an are far farther and more accurately than a crossbow. However, you needed biceps of steel in order to draw it properly.

Yeah, I used a longbow on more than one occassion during my reenactment of the Wars of the Roses. Our bows were limited to a 60lb draw-weight, which is at least half the draw-weight of English 'war' longbows, yet it was a genuine effort to pull that back to your ear and release as I'm not the world's biggest or strongest bloke :-)

Getting back to Glorantha, as the Rathori are larger than your 'average' human, I can see many, if not all of them having the necessary arm and lower back strength (or biceps of steel) to utilise longbows

Link to comment
Share on other sites

13 hours ago, Joerg said:

Actually, no. The triceps and the shoulder musculature are what is required to fire a bow.

It takes two to three days a week training to be able to fire more than two dozen arrows in a span of about as many or less minutes. Military requirement were four dozen arrows, if I am correctly informed.

Lower back muscles are also used when drawing a longbow. If you only use your arms and shoulders, it's even more of an effort to draw the string to your ear.

Englishmen, during the 14th -15th centuries, were required by law to fire at least 10 arrows at a target roughly the size of a fence-post, from a distance of roughly 100 yards, every sunday. When mustering for military campaigns, if they wished to be an archer and be paid almost as much as a mounted knight or man-at-arms, they had to hit the same sized target at least 10 times in one minute. Failure to achieve this meant that they were equipped with bill-hooks or halberds and used as foot-soldiers/'red-shirts' . This meant that any archers with the English armies, either during the 'Hundred Year War' or 'Wars of the Roses', were deadly with their bows, as they'd been using them from an early age.

Just ask us Scots and the French how effective they were! :-D

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 11/17/2017 at 3:36 AM, Brian McReynolds said:

The English/Welsh Longbow was a proven weapon on 15th Century battlefields, yet was never adopted by European countries' armies, who pretty much stuck with 'inferior' crossbows.

(I know that our 15th century is in no way similar to Glorantha's 'bronze-age' tech-level/cultures, but this weapon was historically rare outside of England and Wales so I have no problem with it's rarity within Glorantha.)

Oh no, not again! I'd hate this thread to be another ten-pager on why longbows are/aren't the best medieval weapon ever. Nobody mention slings, either!

  • Like 3
  • Haha 3

Simon Phipp - Caldmore Chameleon - Wallowing in my elitism since 1982. Many Systems, One Family. Just a fanboy. 

www.soltakss.com/index.html

Jonstown Compendium author. Find my contributions here

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest Vile Traveller
2 hours ago, Yelm's Light said:

The RQ3 scenario packs were pretty high-quality, you just had to convert them, which was easy enough.

Yes, but there was too much information in all of them. I never had a bunch of Gloranthaphiles as players, so the ever-expanding (and ever-changing) detail quickly put an end to my gaming in Glorantha. Not that I minded, because the basic RQ2 (and RQ3) system was very adaptable to every other setting I ventured into thereafter.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

5 hours ago, Vile said:

Yes, but there was too much information in all of them. I never had a bunch of Gloranthaphiles as players, so the ever-expanding (and ever-changing) detail quickly put an end to my gaming in Glorantha. Not that I minded, because the basic RQ2 (and RQ3) system was very adaptable to every other setting I ventured into thereafter.

I'll take too much info that I can pick and choose from over too little any day of the week.  At the very least it provided all kinds of ideas for new directions for the players to follow.

1 hour ago, Zit said:

Mostali, Aldryamis and Dragonewts. I don't know how to play them. Too weird for my laziness. I leave them go their way.

Dwarves and elves were really fringe figures for me and my group.  I've only had a couple of players who really wanted to play Aldryami, and literally none that were serious about running a Mostali.  Dragonewts were my go-to deus ex machina NPC's in Sartar because no one ever truly understood their full motivations.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

There are a few things that are at odd with my vision of Glorantha. I change or ignore them.

In my Glorantha the Ducks are an ancient bird tribe cursed by Yelm. They also inherited a shorter stooped shape from the curse, they are thus forever locked into a submissive bow, forced to look at the others from below. After many errands they settled in the area that will become Delecti's swamps and were somehow spared by the Dragonkill War because they are tied to the beast rune. The first Orlanthi explorers coming from the south named the tribe after their totems representing their Wyter as a duck. On many wall paintings or carvings, they are pictured as humanoid ducks, a convenient shortcut for the artist and the viewer. They share some features with their animal ancestors, like webbed hands and feet.

I don't like the Eastern lands and the RQ3 Malkionis neither. Kralorela and the Eastern Islands feel somehow like "the market wants samurais and mandarins, they will be fine here" where the Western lands were too medieval for my taste, I am happy they were "gregged".

I tend to ignore all the "goofy" (to my eyes, of course) things like Leonardo or the Grotarons... and pumpkin headed creatures.   ;)

 

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

50 minutes ago, Revilo Divad Of Dyoll said:

But "while gold by itself will not gain you good soldiers, good soldiers may readily get you gold."

The last time I hired good soldiers, all the gold went to them.

Bad soldiers take all your gold, too, but you don't even achieve your military goals.

Telling how it is excessive verbis

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Locations in Glorantha which I have never used are Slon, Tarien, the Eastern coast of Pamaltela, the Nargan Desert, Vormain, The East Islands, Telos, Valind's Glacier, Koromondol, Brithos, Rathorela, and most of Jrustela.

Critters and races which I never have used are Balucitheres, Dwerelan, Gods incarnated on the mundane plain, Lesser Hydras, Hydras, Gyndrons, Orcs (A Griffin Island aberration which I never accepted) Orveltor,, Ouori, Scythanni, Slarges, Surutran, Titanotheres, True Dragons (unless they're dormant geographical features), Weartagi (although I have used ghosts, wraiths and undead of Waertagi origin, just no living ones), Watchweres, Ysabbau, and Zabdamar.

Cheers.

Evilroddy.

 

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On November 10, 2017 at 2:04 AM, Jon Hunter said:

Are there part of Glorantha that you never use as either you don't like them or you don't understand?

With me ducks never get a mention in games, i have not un-invented them and don't deny them. They just don't appear.

Also Mostali never get used, just because i cant work our how to play them well or involve them in a campaign. 

anyone else?

Jon:

Years ago my circle of RuneQuest players and I jointly and severally ran a cooperative campaign in Balazar, the Elder Wilds and the blank lands of Garsting and Jarst. One player/referee named Dave placed an isolated "Shangri-La" for Ducks in the Nand Valley along the lower Seronde River and called it the Republic of Canardia. Many an evening of silliness and deep frustration was spent arguing and negotiating with the "Founding Feathers" of this quarrelsome and absurd republic in order to repeatedly secure transit rights and safe passage to supply a player established community further upriver called Fort Yrmma. I still twinge and get unsettled thinking about it almost forty years later and I still haven't forgiven Dave for doing that to us! 

Cheers.

Evilroddy.

  • Like 2
  • Haha 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
×
  • Create New...