How Do Chaos Fighting Cults Feel about Arkat the Destroyer?

[Jeff]

12 minutes ago, EricW said:

I think if we think in terms of game play, we should probably keep "detect enemies" simple. If you cast "detect enemies", the spell detects enemies. I don't think it is necessary to nail the definition down too much, it detects people the players would reasonably identify as enemies, either now or later in the scenario - unless there is a good plot reason why they aren't enemies at the time the spell was cast, but became enemies later.

Having said that I think there is a case for suggesting illuminates get a pass from "detect enemies" style spells. Orlanthi think illuminates are chaos, so if you allow Orlanthi to sense illuminates using "detect enemies", you've effectively given them a "detect illuminates" spell, which doesn't seem right at all. 

I'd recommend reading the Detect Enemies spell description on page 259. I think it resolves the concern.

[davecake]

I think of the Arkat cult as usually a mystery cult, AND a sorcery cult. Mystics at the inner core, but they teach it mostly via mysterious and confusing initiatory experiences.

I tend to think a bit of modern initiatory secret societies like the Masons, Rosicrucians, Fraternas Saturni, Thule Bruderschaft, Ordo Templi Orienti, etc, as inspiration, despite the anachronisms. Lots of mysterious secrets revealed only through multiple layers of initiation, lots of esoteric and confusing lore that yields magical powers, but may make sense only to the high initiate, and ultimately a focus on self transformation above all. 

I don't think most of them spend time infiltrating Chaos cults or anything like that. They spend their time doing weird mystic things in the hopes of transforming themselves into mystical supermen. 

But there are many Arkat cults, and some of them probably are more worldly focussed. 

[davecake]

The Lunars have a few intelligence agents (though not as many as some sources suggest), and probably do hatve an active policy of subverting Orlanthi when they can. 

But for the most part, Orlanthi who work with the Lunars don't think of themselves as betraying their nation or tribe to the Lunars. They think of themselves as loyally working for their tribe/clam to defeat rivals in other tribes/clans, and as far as they are concerned they are simply using the Lunars to achieve that. 

This is a frequent historical pattern of how organised empires defeat tribal societies (the English defeat of the Maori, for example). 

The idea of intelligence agencies is largely anachronistic. Individual agents who perform intelligence functions, however, goes back a long way. A certain degree of anachronism is something that we enjoy and of course Glorantha is built on stories as much as history, but deliberate infiltration as a wide scale organised tactic seems a bit too modern to me. But Empires messing with the minds of the barbarians? sure.