Breaking a geas

[Imryn]

16 minutes ago, Joerg said:

History shows that there is a very real possibility in Glorantha for a corrupt, self-serving priesthood or a cotery of hostile magicians to insert themselves between the worshiper and the deity.

If you look at the description of (the storm souls of) the Orlanth-initiates flying to the nearest holy mountain and on to the feasting Hall of Orlanth, you will see how the interaction between the individual and the chief of chiefs goes - it is a personal audience, wherein the worshiper presents himself and his deeds, and asks for recognition and possibly a boon or two. That much is how the regular interaction between worshiper and deity goes. Then there are the moments when the worshiper becomes the deity, casting its rune spells, but those aren't much of an information gathering, and more of a re-affirmation of the deity's deeds in the Godtime that are reflected in that rune power spell.

Finally, there is the interaction with officiating priests and god-talkers who perform divinations, summons of evil, or who initiate other heroquests.

The weekly worship services performed by the priests and the donation of magic points in such rites don't include much of a dialogue with the deity.

Now where in this model does the deity have direct contact with the worshiper? When the worshiper becomes the deity, there is of course a re-affirmation of the worshiper's compatibility, and upon occasion also the lack thereof, resulting in a failed attempt to work the deity's magic. And also in a much weaker way when the worshiper acts like the deity without relying on the rune magic.

In the case of an initiate with a permanent gift and likewise permanent geas it could be argued that there is a permanent check on this relationship, or it could be argued that it is the consciousness of the worshiper (or his realization of an invocation of the gift or the breach of the geas) that alerts the deity. And that might be where Illumination and its effectiveness in warding off reprisals or even reports of malfeasance might come in.

In the breach of a geas or the milder case of a breach of a virtue, the character removes himself a bit from the one-ness with the deity.

Now this sounds like a passage out of a God Learner textbook how to deal with worshipers after you inserted yourself between the worshiper and the deity.

The worshipers want a re-affirmation of the cosmos, or the rightness of the cosmos. That's what they worship for, what they sacrifice some of their personal magic for. And usually, they do so with the intecession of the officiating priests/godtalkers, and probably the clan or temple wyter.

What the deity wants is a re-affirmation of the cosmos, and its role therein, through the reception of these gifts of personal magic from the World of Time. It isn't quite clear how a deity (or another being fully on the Other Side) perceives such interaction with the World of Time - possibly as an extra dimension (or a few) that provide the link to that energy. From this perspective, a sorcerer might perceive a worshiper as a pulsating line that erupts into energy transfers at regular intervals, and at some irregular spaces (times), too.

Not quite correct. In the RuneQuest Glorantha rules, the mechanism for the measurement of the bond between the initiate and the cult object (usually a single deity and its aspects and servants, but other models exist, too) is the transfer of POW, generating Rune Points, and the transfer of magic points that establish and re-affirm the intersection of the World of Time and Godtime. HeroQuest Glorantha (which is as valid for simulating Glorantha as is RQG) knows neither POW nor Rune Points nor Magic Points, which means that these aren't Gloranthan currencies, but RuneQuest rules currencies.

 

This makes a great course paper for a God Learner aiming to manipulate a group of worshipers of a deity he has learned to insert himself into. And like with the historical God Learners, it fails to account for deeper meanings only hinted at overt ritualistic activity.

This is an applicable model for a partial description of the interactions between cultists and cult subjects, but it fails on so many levels that while factually accurate it is wrong at the same time.

I attempted to describe the relationship between the worshipper and the god in mechanistic terms because I was attempting to rationalise it in a way that could be codified in a set of rules for a game. You have, for the most part, restated my comments without the mechanistic terminology.

Nothing in your reply contradicts my core point; to gain access to the gods power a worshipper must sacrifice POW (or whatever you want to call whatever it is that the gods want from worshippers).

In mechanistic terms everything else is just window dressing. Re-affirmation of the cosmos? Worshippers sac MP (a very minor power source) to receive a very minor peaceful feeling. The cult officials (priests, lords, god talkers or anyone else who leads worship ceremonies) is a conduit and a teacher. Yes, they sit as intermediaries between the god and the worshipper but their role is to channel the gods power and to teach the worshippers to channel the power directly in the fullness of time. They have a very limited scope to mislead the worshippers but will be found out very quickly.

In terms of producing internally consistent rules for a game the principal that the character must sacrifice POW to access the gods power is the only one that makes sense to me.

[Joerg]

1 minute ago, Imryn said:

I attempted to describe the relationship between the worshipper and the god in mechanistic terms because I was attempting to rationalise it in a way that could be codified in a set of rules for a game. You have, for the most part, restated my comments without the mechanistic terminology.

I attempted to state the Gloranthan side of things, and I mentioned stuff that your model did not cover. In the end, I mean to point out that the map is not the land, and the algorithm is not the process.

1 minute ago, Imryn said:

Nothing in your reply contradicts my core point; to gain access to the gods power a worshipper must sacrifice POW (or whatever you want to call whatever it is that the gods want from worshippers).

Not really. To access a god's power, an individual might as well travel to the other side, confront the deity and make some other deal, or even a conquest.

Do you think that Harrek sacrificed personal POW when he bound the White Bear God? If so, how much?

1 minute ago, Imryn said:

In mechanistic terms everything else is just window dressing.

That's where I disagree. That's where passions come into play, for instance.

1 minute ago, Imryn said:

Re-affirmation of the cosmos? Worshippers sac MP (a very minor power source) to receive a very minor peaceful feeling.

No. "This is Glorantha!"

The magical energy could be treated very mechanistically to be used up in the renewal of the world at Sacred Time, and a lack thereof might well result in stretches of reality fading away, becoming accessible only at special times, or worse establishing barriers of mist like those of the Ban which mask nothing but Raw Void, or at worst creating actual chasms of void in the middle of everywhere.

Reality is a construct that needs to be upheld. (Or, if you are a Mostali, frozen in Stasis.)

 

1 minute ago, Imryn said:

The cult officials (priests, lords, god talkers or anyone else who leads worship ceremonies) is a conduit and a teacher. Yes, they sit as intermediaries between the god and the worshipper but their role is to channel the gods power and to teach the worshippers to channel the power directly in the fullness of time. They have a very limited scope to mislead the worshippers but will be found out very quickly.

Gloranthan history tells us differently. And even when suspected (aka "found out"), the obscured truth was not easily accessible, and some may not have become accessible again.

 

1 minute ago, Imryn said:

In terms of producing internally consistent rules for a game the principal that the character must sacrifice POW to access the gods power is the only one that makes sense to me.

Yeah, that's the crux of the matter. That is why you want to change the rules to fit them to your understanding, and as long as you do so as your house rules, you're more than welcome.

Your economy might be easily countered with a variation of those Mastercard advertisments:

"Initiation: 1 POW

Resurrection: 3 POW

Gifts and Geasa: priceless"

[Imryn]

8 minutes ago, Shiningbrow said:

Firstly, I like what @Joerg wrote above...

This isn't actually correct! If those gods exist, then there should be nothing stopping them from proving their existence to our satisfaction. Perhaps they're all stuck in their own Great  Cosmic Compromise?? And, of course, when you die, there will be sufficient proof...

I imagine the all of the great philosophers throughout history who have debated whether god exists or not will be pretty shamefaced about now.

 

10 minutes ago, Shiningbrow said:

I disagree with this... but not overly important...

If the rate of exchange differed significantly between gods it would affect the number of worshippers they attracted. I imagine that one god lowering his rates would be seen as a hostile act by the others. It could be seen as a prelude to a war between gods (as opposed to a war between worshippers that the gods get dragged into)

 

13 minutes ago, Shiningbrow said:

This is not actually correct, as @Joerg summarised above.

It also ignores the possibility of what this entire exchange is about... If a god wants validation, and existence, then it will also need loyalty. In return for loyalty (which can be seen as a type of currency), then the god may be willing to grant extra benefits... but is going ot be extra watchful over those individuals which are given those extra benefits. The benefit is called 'Gift", and the loyalty is expressed through "geas".

 

(NB - if this isn't sufficient to make it obvious that people's POW isn't merely the only form of currency a god wants, then consider why animals are often sacrificed... or food and gifts are left "to the god". The word "sacrifice" originally meant having to give up something important to you... picking some flowers and leaving them on an altar is in no way a 'sacrifice'. However, giving up the ability to wear blue hats on Windsday would be (albeit, incredibly minor as sacrifices go...).

Q: which is the more powerful god - the one with 10,000 lay members and only 1 priest  and 5 initiates? Or the god with 5 priests, 10 initiates, and no other lay members?

 

In most mythology I am aware of the gods pre-exist their worshippers. I know there are some special cases, but in general they come first. That being true, I doubt they have much need for "validation" from the mayflies that worship them. "Loyalty" to the god is in fact the one thing that none of the cults require of their worshippers - they allow worshippers to worship as many different gods as they like. "Loyalty" to a principal? Yes they require that in some cases, but that's part of the cults advertising and is often part of the draw for the worshipper.

All of the other junk that gets sacrificed is meaningless compared to the energy sacrifice. It might be required by the god or by the priests as a demonstration of commitment to the god or the cult, but it is meaningless in terms of the amount of the gods power that the worshipper is granted.

Your question is meaningless. The number of worshippers has little or no bearing on a gods power. They were gods before worshippers even existed, and they each have so much power that they can give portions of it to thousands of worshippers without noticing the loss. If all their worshippers died they would not notice the loss.

[Imryn]

10 minutes ago, Joerg said:

Not really. To access a god's power, an individual might as well travel to the other side, confront the deity and make some other deal, or even a conquest.

Do you think that Harrek sacrificed personal POW when he bound the White Bear God? If so, how much?

This jumped out at me, because this thing is unlike the other things. This is where Glorantha differs from every other fantasy world. Heroquesting. It gets mentioned repeatedly in all of the source books, but the actual process is never described in game terms. The closest I have found is the description of the lightbringers quest in King of Sartar, but that description can be read as an almost literal recreation of the quest that the gods themselves undertook, or as a bad am-dram production. With fatalities! In the same vague way the rewards from heroquesting are left completely undefined.

I assume this is all deliberate, to allow each GM and group of players to determine for themselves what is involved and what the rewards are.

One thing is clear to me - heroquesting takes the player outside the normal interaction between a worshipper and a god, and into a relationship with the mythology of the world. Different relationship, different rules I guess, and perhaps one day we will be told what those rules are. Until then we each have to figure it out for ourselves.

28 minutes ago, Joerg said:

That's where I disagree. That's where passions come into play, for instance.

No. "This is Glorantha!"

The magical energy could be treated very mechanistically to be used up in the renewal of the world at Sacred Time, and a lack thereof might well result in stretches of reality fading away, becoming accessible only at special times, or worse establishing barriers of mist like those of the Ban which mask nothing but Raw Void, or at worst creating actual chasms of void in the middle of everywhere.

Reality is a construct that needs to be upheld. (Or, if you are a Mostali, frozen in Stasis.)

Gloranthan history tells us differently. And even when suspected (aka "found out"), the obscured truth was not easily accessible, and some may not have become accessible again.

Yeah, that's the crux of the matter. That is why you want to change the rules to fit them to your understanding, and as long as you do so as your house rules, you're more than welcome.

Your economy might be easily countered with a variation of those Mastercard advertisments:

"Initiation: 1 POW

Resurrection: 3 POW

Gifts and Geasa: priceless"

All of this is just applying "Glorantha" window dressing over the same framework I provided a mechanistic description of. Game rules that aren't based on internally consistent principles are flawed and open to abuse. Having rules that are internally consistent provides for a much more satisfying gaming experience.

Gifts and Geasa: priceless 1 POW per gift

[Joerg]

1 minute ago, Imryn said:

This jumped out at me, because this thing is unlike the other things. This is where Glorantha differs from every other fantasy world. Heroquesting. It gets mentioned repeatedly in all of the source books, but the actual process is never described in game terms. The closest I have found is the description of the lightbringers quest in King of Sartar, but that description can be read as an almost literal recreation of the quest that the gods themselves undertook, or as a bad am-dram production. With fatalities! In the same vague way the rewards from heroquesting are left completely undefined.

To make matters worse, there is a rather fluent border between worship, casting rune magic, and heroquesting. Activities that demand expenditure of rune power, and activities that demand expenditure of magic points from a great number of initiates and lay members, and taking on the mask and mantle of the deity in the face of the deity's Godtime tasks, feats and opponents. Possibly in ways that the Godtime events didn't quite seem to have covered, until you did.

 

1 minute ago, Imryn said:

I assume this is all deliberate, to allow each GM and group of players to determine for themselves what is involved and what the rewards are.

Some ritual spells like e.g. Chalana Arroy's Resurrection are a This World heroquest, although that ritual has an Underworld component, too, and is a very short version of the Lightbringer's Quest from CA's perspective. They still take 3 rune points to perform.

1 minute ago, Imryn said:

One thing is clear to me - heroquesting takes the player outside the normal interaction between a worshipper and a god, and into a relationship with the mythology of the world.

Outside of the normal lay member interaction with the deity, but not necessarily outside of the normal initiate relationship with the deity. Yes, this is where things get fuzzier than you like.

1 minute ago, Imryn said:

Different relationship, different rules I guess, and perhaps one day we will be told what those rules are. Until then we each have to figure it out for ourselves.

I've GMed This World heroquests as pilgrimages with rune point expenditure, or if very codified, just as rune spell ritual. I have sent characters on the Other Side or at least into the border regions, and have allowed them to attune to the flow of runic power rather than invoke sacrificed POW, basing this on the experiences I made playing HeroQuest in varying incarnations, including games with Greg and Jeff.

 

1 minute ago, Imryn said:

All of this is just applying "Glorantha" window dressing over the same framework I provided a mechanistic description of.

There is no window dressing. Your mechanistic description has significant gaps.

1 minute ago, Imryn said:

Game rules that aren't based on internally consistent principles are flawed and open to abuse. Having rules that are internally consistent provides for a much more satisfying gaming experience.

If ruleplaying is your road to enjoyment, yes. And it is not like I haven't been down that road once, either. But a quarter of a century later, I find myself a whole lot deeper into Glorantha and a whole lot less deep into the RuneQuest rules than back then.

1 minute ago, Imryn said:

Gifts and Geasa: priceless 1 POW per gift

YRQGDV: house rule, ok. RQG amendment: over the dead bodies of at least 99% of all Humakti and Yelmalian player characters ever played. (And I never played any, and GMed very few...)

[Imryn]

10 minutes ago, Joerg said:

If ruleplaying is your road to enjoyment, yes. And it is not like I haven't been down that road once, either. But a quarter of a century later, I find myself a whole lot deeper into Glorantha and a whole lot less deep into the RuneQuest rules than back then.

YRQGDV: house rule, ok. RQG amendment: over the dead bodies of at least 99% of all Humakti and Yelmalian player characters ever played. (And I never played any, and GMed very few...)

I think you misunderstand my intent. I don't like ruleplaying, I find it disrupts the roleplaying that is at the core of all enjoyable games. If a set of rules are internally consistent the number of "special rules" and "special exceptions" goes way down and reduces the need to refer to rule books. My perfect game rules would be so internally consistent that there would be no need to even bring the books to a game session. You can get the same effect when playing with a really good GM, but alas they are rare.

I take your point about Humakti and Yelmalian players, and will be looking over my shoulder for some time  I have to say though that even as a 16 year old playing a Humakti initiate running around in the rubble I thought that getting "free" gifts was OP.

[Imryn]

32 minutes ago, Joerg said:

There is no window dressing. Your mechanistic description has significant gaps.

I think that the gaps that you are seeing are areas that don't need to be covered by mechanistic rules. The rules only need to cover interactions between player characters and their gods - interactions between the general mass of worshippers and the gods can be described separately and don't need specific rules as long as they don't contradict the rules for player character / god interactions. And there will be no contradictions if the rules are written correctly.

[Shiningbrow]

How do you deal with Shamans getting new abilities?

RAW, they sacrifice attributes, until such time as they accept a geas/taboo.

(I'm just coming from the perspective that gods are only interested in POW in order to hand over their gifts/abilities, etc). Similarly, HQ's, although not yet given for RQG, were written up in MRQ... and no POW is sacrificed in order to get nice new shinies... meaning, from your perspective, gifts don't need to be 'paid for' (as just doing a HQ is not a real payment, if the only currency is POW).

Also, just advancing up the religious chain is another form of 'gift'... with no POW necessary. Requirements for Rune Lord are pretty minimal (with regards to the relationship with the god... ie, no extra POW needed to have been sacrificed). There are conditions attached (ie, geas)... eg, no consorting with the enemy gods.

[Imryn]

37 minutes ago, Shiningbrow said:

How do you deal with Shamans getting new abilities?

RAW, they sacrifice attributes, until such time as they accept a geas/taboo.

(I'm just coming from the perspective that gods are only interested in POW in order to hand over their gifts/abilities, etc). Similarly, HQ's, although not yet given for RQG, were written up in MRQ... and no POW is sacrificed in order to get nice new shinies... meaning, from your perspective, gifts don't need to be 'paid for' (as just doing a HQ is not a real payment, if the only currency is POW).

Also, just advancing up the religious chain is another form of 'gift'... with no POW necessary. Requirements for Rune Lord are pretty minimal (with regards to the relationship with the god... ie, no extra POW needed to have been sacrificed). There are conditions attached (ie, geas)... eg, no consorting with the enemy gods.

I am not as familiar with shamanic magic, but; sacrificing attributes represents life force maybe? I believe the sacrifice is not made to a god, so maybe whatever the source they are sacrificing to wants life force not soul?

Transitioning from initiate is quite easy (easier with these rules than with earlier ones I think) but, I think that additional points of POW sacrificed to gain RP is an unwritten part of the process. I can't imagine a Rune Lord with just 3 RP anyway. Some gods require RL's to take gifts and I would have those gifts cost 1 POW each. Additional restrictions are more mundane than magical, and those benefits that are magical are assumed to be granted with the extra responsibilities. Overall, I would say that having a minimum number of RP as a requirement would be an improvement, but not really necessary.

As I've said, I think heroquesting falls outside the normal worshipper / god relationship.

Edit: I was just trolling through the cult entries and noticed this under The Seven Mothers Rune Lord requirements:

"Finally, the candidate must convince the examiners, a test simulated by a roll of POW×3 or less on D100, with +3% for every Rune point the candidate has."

Most cults don't have this requirement, but I think it would be a pretty good idea if they did.

Edited June 17, 2019 by Imryn

[PhilHibbs]

2 hours ago, Imryn said:

Game rules that aren't based on internally consistent principles are flawed and open to abuse.

Well, that's Glorantha for you. Remember that it was not designed to be a game world! According to Greg, it wasn't even designed, it was discovered. He believed that he was revealing something that stemmed directly from the human experience of the transcendent.*

Think of it like a Game of Thrones RPG - should the rules explain what gods are within the world and how they work? GRRM has not revealed that, maybe he himself does not know or has not really decided on all the details.

*Or some such wordage. Either that or he was trolling us and he's just another Carlos Castaneda, but I choose to take him at his word.

[Imryn]

39 minutes ago, PhilHibbs said:

Well, that's Glorantha for you. Remember that it was not designed to be a game world! According to Greg, it wasn't even designed, it was discovered. He believed that he was revealing something that stemmed directly from the human experience of the transcendent.*

Think of it like a Game of Thrones RPG - should the rules explain what gods are within the world and how they work? GRRM has not revealed that, maybe he himself does not know or has not really decided on all the details.

*Or some such wordage. Either that or he was trolling us and he's just another Carlos Castaneda, but I choose to take him at his word.

I think any fantasy world can be a game world; its just a matter of coming up with a suitable, consistent, rule system. If events in the worlds history cannot be reconciled with the rules then leave them as myths whose provenance and details are in doubt.

As for GoT, there is little accessible magic in the world, and it is all countered by mundane methods so it would be quite easy to convert. If you wanted to make it really simple just have all the users of magic be NPC's.

[Imryn]

3 hours ago, Joerg said:

Some ritual spells like e.g. Chalana Arroy's Resurrection are a This World heroquest, although that ritual has an Underworld component, too, and is a very short version of the Lightbringer's Quest from CA's perspective. They still take 3 rune points to perform.

I don't see how this could be a heroquest? Looking at the description of the resurrect rune spell it seems straight forward; fix up the corpse, cast the rune spell, engage in spirit combat to stuff the spirit back in the corpse, job done. Is there some other ritual you are talking about?

[PhilHibbs]

19 minutes ago, Imryn said:

...it seems straight forward; fix up the corpse, cast the rune spell...

Like Joerg already said, there's no hard line between "casting a rune spell" and a Heroquest. Any time you cast a rune spell, you do what the God did. You provably become the god for an instant, because only that god could do that, in order to invoke the god's power. When you cast Resurrection, you invoke Chalana Arroy, you do what she did, and for that moment you are Chalana Arroy's manifestation in the world. Of course this is all a bit deep for a game system like RuneQuest, it may be alluded to in the rules, and no doubt will be elaborated in the G&GoG.

Edited June 17, 2019 by PhilHibbs

[Joerg]

5 minutes ago, Imryn said:

I don't see how this could be a heroquest? Looking at the description of the resurrect rune spell it seems straight forward; fix up the corpse, cast the rune spell, engage in spirit combat to stuff the spirit back in the corpse, job done. Is there some other ritual you are talking about?

First off, it is a ritual spell, meaning it isn't just one melee round of ticking of three rune points.

"This spell summons the deceased spirit to approach its former body."

There are two ways such a summoning can be played out. One is that you draw a summoning circle or similar magical focus, then recite the name and deeds of the resurrectee and pour magical energies into the corpse and the circle in order to call up the spirit. Mechanistic, boring... possibly how the Zzaburi sorcerers of Brithos and colonies handle a resurrection.

The other way is more shamanic in nature - the summoner descends to Hell, singles out the resurrectee and leads her back to her healed body. The bout of spirit combat would be dealing with the spirit's inertia, keeping it from turning back on the way up, etc etc. The ritual will have the questing priestess encounter numerous mask-bearers offering support or hindrance, involving a number of volunteers to take part in this rite.

Basically, this is a chance for your players to get involved in the rite, possibly create some minor bonus or malus due to their performance as one of the deities the priestess confronts in the role of Chalana Arroy. And playing the part of the deity may offer the participants insights in their cult lore, and possibly help them regain a rune point if they perform well.

No, the rules as written don't offer this as the default option. If they did for every such spell, the rules would be the size of the Guide. But putting in this narrative, demanding a few die rolls and confronting the players with the myths of their culture might be worth regarding this ritual as a This World heroquest. I have seen this done, and creating a strong experience for the involved players, within the matter of a few minutes.

This is building on the strengths of Glorantha. Don't let a dry rules mechanics text get in the way.

[Imryn]

Thank you @PhilHibbs and @Joerg for taking my Glorantha (and Runequest) education a stage further.

I suppose on some level I was aware that the character was channeling the gods power when casting a rune spell, but had not considered that they might actually become the god for that split second.

The descriptions of how the rituals for resurrection could be played out were equally interesting and insightful. This is the sort of play I want in my games, but this type of immersive roleplaying is built on a solid foundation of mechanistic rules. In a game session any time spent on discussing what rules mean, or imply, or suggest is time that is not available for roleplaying. I realise that for someone who is as immersed in the lore as you appear to be it is all second nature - I imagine that you could probably run a campaign without ever cracking a book, and that's great, but you aren't the target audience for a rule book. The target audience is people who are fairly new to the game . The more coherent the rules, the fewer special cases there are, the simpler it is for them to get past the mechanics and into the good stuff.

Talking of the guide, I got that and am working my way through it slowly but surely. I may be weird but I like thick rule books, it tells me that the writers are serious about creating a detailed set of rules in a detailed world. Sometimes they are a mess, and I am disappointed, but sometimes it means they have taken the time to come up with something special.

[PhilHibbs]

6 hours ago, Imryn said:

Heroquesting. It gets mentioned repeatedly in all of the source books, but the actual process is never described in game terms. The closest I have found is the description of the lightbringers quest in King of Sartar, but that description can be read as an almost literal recreation of the quest that the gods themselves undertook, or as a bad am-dram production.

Bad am-dram productions are at the heart of Gloranthan heroquesting!

https://kingofdragonpass.fandom.com/wiki/Uralda's_Blessing

[Imryn]

1 minute ago, PhilHibbs said:

Bad am-dram productions are at the heart of Gloranthan heroquesting!

https://kingofdragonpass.fandom.com/wiki/Uralda's_Blessing

you snipped too soon

6 hours ago, Imryn said:

... bad am-dram production. With fatalities! ..

 

[PhilHibbs]

4 minutes ago, Imryn said:

you snipped too soon

... bad am-dram production. With fatalities! ..

Yep.

(although in this case he gets better... maybe...)

Edited June 17, 2019 by PhilHibbs

[soltakss]

On 6/17/2019 at 8:40 AM, Imryn said:

No, we did that! What we didn't have was geases being broken by things completely outside the players control (i.e. they were unconscious at the time)

I've put spoilers around this, as it involves breaking a celibacy geas, but not by choice.

So, an extreme example, a Unicorn Rider has a geas of Complete Celibacy, but she is knocked unconscious and is assaulted. This has an immediate effect that her Unicorn will not let her ride him, as she is no longer a virgin, no matter that she did not break the geas willingly. Now, the Yelorna cult might not know what happened, until she shows as being pregnant, then the High Priestess might ask her about her geas, which was clearly broken. Now, it wouldn't be fair to punish her for what happened, but she might have to take another geas to replace the one broken to keep her gifts or standing in the cult. However, to regain the use of a unicorn, she would need to go through the cleansing ritual to make herself a virgin again, in which case she could possibly attract a different unicorn, but I'd say that her relationship with her original unicorn is permanently and irrevocably broken.

[Imryn]

On 6/21/2019 at 9:59 PM, soltakss said:

I've put spoilers around this, as it involves breaking a celibacy geas, but not by choice.

  Hide contents

 

So, an extreme example, a Unicorn Rider has a geas of Complete Celibacy, but she is knocked unconscious and is assaulted. This has an immediate effect that her Unicorn will not let her ride him, as she is no longer a virgin, no matter that she did not break the geas willingly. Now, the Yelorna cult might not know what happened, until she shows as being pregnant, then the High Priestess might ask her about her geas, which was clearly broken. Now, it wouldn't be fair to punish her for what happened, but she might have to take another geas to replace the one broken to keep her gifts or standing in the cult. However, to regain the use of a unicorn, she would need to go through the cleansing ritual to make herself a virgin again, in which case she could possibly attract a different unicorn, but I'd say that her relationship with her original unicorn is permanently and irrevocably broken.

 

I am not sure why you would chose this example. Of all the concepts from our world that have been translated across to Glorantha "celibacy" is absolutely the worst realised. In our world the whole concept is wrapped up in the christian churches hatred of women and desire to prevent women from having any form of control over men, and especially church officials. Distrust, and the desire to absolutely control women didn't start with the christian's; controlling reproduction by controlling women has been a key element in a great many religions throughout history.

Any slight amount of thought leads to the obvious conclusion that there was never any need to excerpt that type of control over women in Glorantha - If you want to know who fathered the woman's child you just ask her, after casting a truth spell.

Putting aside the historical context, the purpose of a "vow of celibacy" is to prevent the person taking the vow from being "corrupted by sins of the flesh". In the real world this refers to the pleasures of fornication, and i suppose from that point of view there is some justification for the same vow being present in Glorantha. What I am not sure about is your interpretation that a rape victim has somehow been "corrupted by sins of the flesh". I have not been raped, however I understand that is anything but pleasurable, and leaves many and varied mental scars.

I would like to know just how the unicorn was aware of her change of status - do they conduct an inspection before allowing the rider to mount? Why would the unicorn think the rider was no longer suitable just because they had been assaulted by a rapist? In a world with magical healing that can regrow severed limbs, regrowing a broken hymen is trivial, and for that matter I understand the act of riding a horse can cause the hymen to break even if the rider has never had sex - does a unicorn reject the rider if that happens?

Putting aside all of the absurdities, If I was GM I would not bring such a distasteful aspect into my games, and if it somehow did creep in I would certainly not punish the rape victim for the crime - there is way too much of that in the real world for us to also have it in our escapist fantasy world. In my Glorantha the High Priestess would task the woman with hunting down the rapist and his friends and returning their heads and genitals to the temple where they would be prominently displayed, and the unicorn would enthusiastically help with this quest.

As a complete aside, I wouldn't use any of the celibacy geases in my Glorantha because I think they are absurd in the real world and utterly absurd in Glorantha. I would substitute the "Feel no love" geas instead which has the same general effect without all the real world overtones.

Edited June 24, 2019 by Imryn

[The God Learner]

5 minutes ago, Imryn said:

Of all the concepts from our world that have been translated across to Glorantha "celibacy" is absolutely the worst realised. In our world the whole concept is wrapped up in the christian churches hatred of women

Don't forget the Buddhist hatred of women! 

5 minutes ago, Imryn said:

I would like to know just how the unicorn was aware of her change of status - do they conduct an inspection before allowing the rider to mount

A silly objection, but if you prefer to have modern, sex-positive unicorns, then by all means go ahead. (If nothing else, I'm sure the Lunars have plenty of them.) 

[Shiningbrow]

3 hours ago, Imryn said:

I am not sure why you would chose this example. Of all the concepts from our world that have been translated across to Glorantha "celibacy" is absolutely the worst realised. In our world the whole concept is wrapped up in the christian churches hatred of women and desire to prevent women from having any form of control over men, and especially church officials. Distrust, and the desire to absolutely control women didn't start with the christian's; controlling reproduction by controlling women has been a key element in a great many religions throughout history.

Any slight amount of thought leads to the obvious conclusion that there was never any need to excerpt that type of control over women in Glorantha - If you want to know who fathered the woman's child you just ask her, after casting a truth spell.

Putting aside the historical context, the purpose of a "vow of celibacy" is to prevent the person taking the vow from being "corrupted by sins of the flesh". In the real world this refers to the pleasures of fornication, and i suppose from that point of view there is some justification for the same vow being present in Glorantha. What I am not sure about is your interpretation that a rape victim has somehow been "corrupted by sins of the flesh". I have not been raped, however I understand that is anything but pleasurable, and leaves many and varied mental scars.

I would like to know just how the unicorn was aware of her change of status - do they conduct an inspection before allowing the rider to mount? Why would the unicorn think the rider was no longer suitable just because they had been assaulted by a rapist? In a world with magical healing that can regrow severed limbs, regrowing a broken hymen is trivial, and for that matter I understand the act of riding a horse can cause the hymen to break even if the rider has never had sex - does a unicorn reject the rider if that happens?

Putting aside all of the absurdities, If I was GM I would not bring such a distasteful aspect into my games, and if it somehow did creep in I would certainly not punish the rape victim for the crime - there is way too much of that in the real world for us to also have it in our escapist fantasy world. In my Glorantha the High Priestess would task the woman with hunting down the rapist and his friends and returning their heads and genitals to the temple where they would be prominently displayed, and the unicorn would enthusiastically help with this quest.

As a complete aside, I wouldn't use any of the celibacy geases in my Glorantha because I think they are absurd in the real world and utterly absurd in Glorantha. I would substitute the "Feel no love" geas instead which has the same general effect without all the real world overtones.

The way I see this...

Firstly, unfortunately, yes, being raped would be a breach of the geas - no less so than being unconscious and forced onto a horse, bound and tied and having horseflesh or fowl forced down your throat, and any of the other unintended geas breakages.

As for why celibacy can be seen as a valid geas - because, as you point out, " In the real world this refers to the pleasures of fornication". Giving up such pleasures would be a form of actual 'sacrifice' (much moreso than killing off some chickens or cows, of dropping off some food/wine). It would represent a real 'something important to give up' to many people.

Whether Gloranthan deities would want to see that - well, Humakt I can definitely see taking that sacrifice... He's not known for being a party animal, and so ruining all your fun would be right up his alley. Another aspect to that would be pregnancy - Humakt doesn't want you connected to any form of family (and what you did have you're severed from). So, basically, the geas is severing all ties to others - including romantic.

Yelmalio, the other god offering up gifts in exchange for geasa, is also a bit of a downer god. Also, quite controlling. And, IIRC, patriarchal. Where there's patriarchy, control of sex isn't far behind!

 

Unicorns... hey, they're magical! They just know!

[albinoboo]

3 hours ago, The God Learner said:

Don't forget the Buddhist hatred of women! 

A silly objection, but if you prefer to have modern, sex-positive unicorns, then by all means go ahead. (If nothing else, I'm sure the Lunars have plenty of them.) 

That's not a Unicorn, that's a broo

[Joerg]

3 hours ago, Imryn said:

I am not sure why you would chose this example. Of all the concepts from our world that have been translated across to Glorantha "celibacy" is absolutely the worst realised. In our world the whole concept is wrapped up in the christian churches hatred of women and desire to prevent women from having any form of control over men, and especially church officials. Distrust, and the desire to absolutely control women didn't start with the christian's; controlling reproduction by controlling women has been a key element in a great many religions throughout history.

Originally, celibacy was meant to make sure that there would be no inheritable bishoprics, an instrument to keep investiture as a power of the head of the church. The patriarchic elements probably were inherent in both the Jewish and the Roman roots of the church, despite the fairly hippy elements in the original community.

Church took control over reproduction only fairly lately, according to Diarmaid MacCullogh's BBC documentary "Sex and the Church". The early church expanded into higher society mainly through female converts.

[PhilHibbs]

7 hours ago, Imryn said:

I would like to know just how the unicorn was aware of her change of status - do they conduct an inspection before allowing the rider to mount?

It just knows. Nobody knows how.

7 hours ago, Imryn said:

Putting aside all of the absurdities, If I was GM I would not bring such a distasteful aspect into my games,

I'm right with you on that one. Some groups might be comfortable exploring this particular dark corner, and that's fine, but it's not for me.