Advice for Satarite Campaign

[Armadeus]

I'm going to be running a game set in Sartar/Dragon Pass soon. The PCs are going to be the young adult children of members of the clan ring/prominent thanes who get tasked by the ring to be kind of problem solvers in an attempt to make a name for themselves and make them worthy of inheriting their parents prominence.

The way I'm currently thinking about doing prep is taking the Dragon Pass board game map (available via google image search), noting where the PCs clan tula is, figuring out where the other clans/tribes are, stocking some hexes they are likely to go through using the Ruins & Relics tables from the old Judges Guild Wilderlands products (ignoring the ones that aren't very Glorantha), and putting 5-10 ruins/dungeons for them to explore because both my group and I like dungeons. Then I would use a random hook generator I have to make up what problem the ring needs dealing with (or what problems they can pick from) in a given session.

Does anyone have any advice for this sort of game? What are some things that can be interpreted as dungeons that exist in Dragon Pass/Sartar? What are the best things I can read in a short time to get my head around that area of Glorantha? What would be a good way to introduce my players to being Orlanthi?

If it matters I am using OpenQuest with some stuff borrowed from RQ 6.

[jeffjerwin]

You may want to get the Sartar Companion for HeroQuest. It has a bunch of adventures as well as pages upon pages of random encounters.

[hkokko]

There is an Encounter Generator that might help here. See the link in my signature

[Joerg]

There is no shortage of EWF era or earlier ruins in Dragon Pass, or ancient tombs, which may hold if not artifacts then magical clues or secrets to discover.

13th Age Glorantha has a number of new takes on dungeons, too, if for a D20-like system.

[soltakss]

On 7/31/2018 at 1:07 AM, Armadeus said:

I'm going to be running a game set in Sartar/Dragon Pass soon. The PCs are going to be the young adult children of members of the clan ring/prominent thanes who get tasked by the ring to be kind of problem solvers in an attempt to make a name for themselves and make them worthy of inheriting their parents prominence.

Sounds like a good basis for a Sartarite campaign.

 

The way I'm currently thinking about doing prep is taking the Dragon Pass board game map (available via google image search), noting where the PCs clan tula is, figuring out where the other clans/tribes are, stocking some hexes they are likely to go through using the Ruins & Relics tables from the old Judges Guild Wilderlands products (ignoring the ones that aren't very Glorantha), and putting 5-10 ruins/dungeons for them to explore because both my group and I like dungeons. Then I would use a random hook generator I have to make up what problem the ring needs dealing with (or what problems they can pick from) in a given session.

Sounds good.

For me, a clan tula is probably a single hex on the Dragon Pass board, with the surrounding 6 hexes considered clannish lands, but maybe with overlaps to other clans. 

Have you given any thought to where the other clan tules would be? That can generate scenarios straight off.

Have you looked at the Judges Guild RQ scenarios? I have used Duck Pond and Duck Tower very well in Glorantha, around the Upland Marsh. I always thought that Hellpits of Night Fang wasn't that good, but it fitted in to a Pavis campaign very easily and would work well in Dragon Pass. Broken Tree Inn works well in Dragon Pass.

 

Does anyone have any advice for this sort of game? What are some things that can be interpreted as dungeons that exist in Dragon Pass/Sartar? What are the best things I can read in a short time to get my head around that area of Glorantha? What would be a good way to introduce my players to being Orlanthi?

The HeroQuest Sartar books have already been mentioned. I would try to get the Dragon Pass Gazetteer, as it drips scenario hooks off every page. 

As for Dungeons, Snake Pipe Hollow is a classic. The aforementioned JG RQ supplements work very well. Every place marked as a ruin on the Dragon Pass Map should have at least one Dungeon, but they might not always be your classic "Cave System/Underground complex filled with monsters" kind of Dungeon. The Upland Marsh should have a lot of EWF ruins, if there aren't any then just make them up. Even temples might be built on older temples, perhaps long-forgotten, delving into these ancient crypts and sub-temples might be good. Chaos Temples make good Dungeons and can be put almost anywhere. In fact, enemy Temples make good Dungeons.

How to introduce Orlanthiness to players?

• Hospitality - This is very important to Orlanthi, when you are accepted as a guest in a clan, you are under the protection of both the Chief and the Clan, so attempts to insult you or force you to break the rules of Hospitality are good for roleplaying.
• Travelling through other clan's lands - Entering another clan's tula means engaging in a lot of ritual posturing, which might make for good roleplaying, especially if the other clan is hostile to the PCs' Clan or to the PCs themselves.
• Cattle Raiding - Nothing says "Orlanthi" like a spot of cattle raiding, especially if you kill one fo the guards defending the cattle, or are attacked by raiders trying to get your cattle
• Foul Slime - Orlanthi have poetry for everything, in fact Orlanth is the God of Bad Poetry*. Meet a Yelmalian - There's a poem for that. Meet some Chaos - There's a poem for that. Meet other Orlanth - There's a poem for that. Sure, some are only for Wind Lords, but there's no reason you can't all join in, we used to and had a great time reciting Orlanthi poetry.
• Violence is Always an Option/Nobody can make me do Anything - Orlanthi are stubborn and unpredictable, so treat them that way. If not the PCs, then NPCs might use those forms. At the end of the day, if endlessly talking something through isn't working, then drawing your sword and saying "Enough Talk!" normally works.

* He isn't, according to Gloranthan Lore, but you know what I mean ...

[jeffjerwin]

3 hours ago, soltakss said:

 

For me, a clan tula is probably a single hex on the Dragon Pass board, with the surrounding 6 hexes considered clannish lands, but maybe with overlaps to other clans. 

 

A tula = 1 hex. Surrounding hexes belong to other clans [or other groups, including nonhumans], with most, but perhaps not all, being part of the same tribe. It's probably more interesting to make the tula border a neighbouring neutral or hostile tribe for generating some adventures...

[jajagappa]

4 hours ago, soltakss said:

The Upland Marsh should have a lot of EWF ruins, if there aren't any then just make them up.

Wyrms Footnotes #15 has a good map of this area including ruins.  One, the Howling Tower, is described in Sartar: Kingdom of Heroes.

[simonh]

Plenty of options given already. Bear in mind the region has been occupied for hundreds of years, but there are many ruins and abandoned settlements that make great homes for newly arrived threats.

Delecti frequently sends incursions of undead to steal away corpses or the unwary living. Chaos creatures can wander u from the Print or down from Snakepipe Holow or elsewhere. Trolls frequently travel through Sartar on their way between Dagori Inkarth and the Shadow Plateau without incident, but every now and then some of them go rogue like Whieteye. Lunar deserters can be a real problem, as can Sartarite deserters for that matter. Outright banditry is a thing. Praxian outcasts are a thing too. Beast valley isn’t far away, and there’s always the Tusk Riders.