Quick note: these look almost like "grudges" from an ongoing RQ game ("Why was I killed? Why wasn't I resurrected? Why did I have to pay?"). I'm sure this is deceptive, just as I'm sure that our opinions aren't being sought merely for use as ammunition in a dispute with your GM.
> 1) What is the correct reward for a Heal spell?
The usual rates for Spirit Magic and Divine Magic spell-casting can be found in the RQ3 Gamemaster's Book; most people would know these (they're the "market rate"), and would be very pleased to receive Healing for less. A Heal 6 would be charged at 6 Lunars to a close friend, 60 Lunars to a stranger. A Resurrection has a notional cost of 90 Lunars to a Chalana Arroy cultist, 300 Lunars to anyone else friendly. Remember, 300 Lunars is a whole year's income for a peasant: if that looks "rather cheap" in your game, consider how closely your campaign aligns with the rates in RQ3, and adjust as appropriate.
See the section on "Payment for Services" in the full cult writeup (ROC p.172) for more: this recommends "appropriately generous gifts" for anyone saved from disease, poison, maiming or death by a Healer: from half a year's milk production, to the foundation of an expensive new temple...
> 2) Why should you pay if you can not afford it?
How can you "not afford it"? RQ3 explicitly states the value of almost anything you can do: in work, in services rendered, in equivalent value. The Healers have an obligation to heal -- they've sworn an oath to do so. If you're brought back from death's door by a Healer, you know full well that you ought to give her something generous: if you *decide* not to, what kind of person are you? You're a poor peasant (300 L/year), she's Resurrected you -- OK, you owe her a year's work. What's so important that you'd rather have been left dead to get on with it?
Nobody's saying your "payment" has to be in coinage: healers' halls need cleaners, their kitchens need cooks, their larders need filling, and these are all ways where almost *anyone* can afford to help out. And if you're *really* so destitute that you can't spare a moment of your time or toil for the Healer, maybe she'll set you another kind of "payment" -- like moving yourself and your family off the no-good land at Rotroot where you're starving to death up to rejoin the rest of the clan, and patching up whatever old feud or falling-out it was that left you in such an unsustainable place. OK, maybe that impacts on your character concept and campaign goals; but it probably doesn't do as much for them as being left dead would have done, does it, eh?
And if the Healer tells you to make your peace with the Lunars and live quietly henceforth, as her "repayment" for bringing you back to life (or curing your disease, or regrowing your sword arm, or whatever it may be), what are you going to do? Thar's a Big Campaign Issue!
> 3) Why don't the White Ladies resurrect everyone they can, even poor
> peasants?
They do, if they can. With the caveat that (as we all know by now) Resurrection is less common in "real" Glorantha than it appears from the RQ rules, the Healers have no particular reason *not* to cast it on anyone who would benefit -- and they certainly shouldn't have a financial motive uppermost when granting or denying access to their magics.
But consider how the peasant died. Old age? No point in Resurrection, then; he'll be dead again before long. Fighting broo? Needs a *lot* of other work, then, making sure he's cured of any diseases... this will be trickier than a straight Resurrection; OTOH, it may be more "deserved" (if someone dies protecting a Healer, or a community, the Healers are more likely to work hard bringing them back). Just larking around or getting into fights? Perhaps not worth healing: who knows how short a time it'll be before they do it again? Died a few days ago? Probably not worth it, again: the stat deterioration will mean they're "better off dead" (either they're in Orlanth's Hall and enjoying themselves, or else they're not in which case we shouldn't be wasting valuable healing magics on them, should we, now?).
IMO, Healers would most likely save their Resurrections for obviously worthy cases -- children killed in accidents, mothers dying in childbirth, innocent victims of mayhem, slain warriors brought back from the field of battle -- and not zap 'em off whenever they see a stiffy. After all: Resurrection takes time and effort, and leaves you without the use of the spell for half a week afterwards.
Sandy Petersen wrote a lengthy ecological piece about the number of Resurrections castable in Boldhome, some years back: you may find it with a search through old Digests. It took a rules-literalist approach to the number of Healers, number of spells, etc., and asked what the world would look like if everything worked the way it was described. (Answer: pleasantly reasonable).
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Nick
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