Date: Wed, 17 Feb 93 00:29:25 +0100
From: RuneQuest-Request@Glorantha.Holland.Sun.COM (Digest Subscriptions)
To: RuneQuest@Glorantha.Holland.Sun.COM (Daily automated RQ-Digest)
Subject: The RuneQuest Daily, Tue, 16 Feb 1993
This is an semi-automated digest, sent out once per day (if any
messages are pending). Replies will be included in the next issue
automatically.
Selected articles may also appear in a regular Digest. If you
want to submit articles to the Digest only, contact the editor at
RuneQuest-Digest-Editor@Glorantha.Holland.Sun.COM.
--
Send Submissions to:
Enquiries to:
The RuneQuest Daily is a spin-off of the RuneQuest Digest and deals
with the subjects of Avalon Hill's RPG and Greg Stafford's world of
Glorantha. Maintainer: Henk.Langeveld@Sun.COM
---------------------
From: jor@solace.hsh.se (Joakim Rastberg)
Subject: RQ based MUD
Message-ID: <199302151142.AA19571@krynn.solace.hsh.se>
Date: 15 Feb 93 13:42:24 GMT
Hello RQ'ers Worldwide.
We (some youngish RQ-lovers) here in Sweden are building a MudOS based
mudlib that are to be set in a Glorantha-styled world in the Lesser
Darkness. The object of the game is (naturally) to release the Sun.
The skillsystem used is simplified d100 based but any RQ or CoC player
should feel at home.
Now I wonder what legal implications that may arise. I have (so far)
not used any Gloranthan name, nor is the actual quests pure
"lightbringer" style. So AH don't need to assemble their Lunar troops
(lawyers) yet...
The MUD is free of all charges and its ip and portno is available on
request.We have worked on it since August -92 and hope to open for the
public this spring.
Now I wonder: can I use monsters from Glorantha (is "rubble runner" TM'ed???),
could I use the Gloranthan map (Prax-Dragon Pass?), Is the Gloranthan Gods
Trademarked?? (Humakt?). If I changed all names, do that hold the lunars off?
Can anyone with authority give me a hint how I should proceed?
Cordially Yours/ Joakim Rastberg (jor@solace.hsh.se jor@ts.se)
---------------------
From: pvanheus@frodo.cs.uct.ac.za (P A van Heusden)
Subject: The Gloranthan Question
Message-ID:
Date: 15 Feb 93 14:26:51 GMT
Tim Leask bleats:
> If you want to play non-Glorantha why play BRPS why not GURPS there's plenty
^^^^^^^^^
how about the GURPS rules stink?
> more material available. The thing that distinguish RQ from all the other
> systems is Glorantha, not the BRPS. As others have said the thing that nearly
> killed (or did it RQ actually die but was resurrected ?) RQ was the slowness
> with which new material was released. The last thing RQ needs is a division
> of scarce talent now that momentum for Gloranthan material is on the rise.
At last my patience is exhausted. 1) No, I don't want non-Gloranthan
world supplements. I make my own world, based on Earth. That's up to
the DM. Any DM who takes any world supplement as gospel truth should
be shot. This includes Glorantha: You can't tell me the average DM
does not re-interpret the myths and legends into his own (slightly
different) form. 2) I PLAY RUNEQUEST BECAUSE RUNEQUEST IS THE BEST
FANTASY RULE SYSTEM THERE IS, BETTER THAN GURPS, BETTER THAN AD&D
(ICK!), BETTER THAN ROLEMASTER, BETTER THAN ANYTHING ELSE. Get it? NOT
BECAUSE OF YOUR SILLY WORLD SHAPED LIKE A LOZENGE. (Ok, I DON'T hate
Glorantha, just Gloranthan purist twits) 3) RQ3 was a failure NOT
because it was not so Gloranthan, but because the new rules were badly
playtested (if at all) and REALLY STINK in a large number of respects.
The one good thing is that it is a modular system. If you don't like a
section, you can chuck it out and not break the whole system. That is
what I am doing. 4) RQII was all fine and well, but I LIKE THE RULES,
and I REALLY DON'T CARE ABOUT HOW MANY POINTS IT TAKES TO BECOME A
RUNELORD, so, stick the Runelord stuff in the Gloranthan book (well,
most people know it already) and stick the RULES IN THE RULE BOOK.
That way, you please everyone (include the Gloranthan book (a GOOD
version) with the RQ box if you want to.) - you are not destroying
Glorantha, but you gain the market of NON GLORANTHAN PLAYERS.
> I've played through Vikings and Land of Ninja, whilst these were both
> excellent supplements neither of them was RQ. One was a game of Vikings,
> one was a game of Land of Ninja, in both cases the campaign ended shortly
> after the provided scenarios were completed. This was despite having
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ tough. I happen to like
creating new scenarios, maybe you guys like Glorantha. Just don't try
and hi-jack my game system.
> an excellent Referee who was highly knowledgeable and very imaginative.
> He prefered to spend his time working on Glorathan adventures becuase
> there was more material and more interesting setting provided.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ obvious
subjective value judgement
The problem with Viking etc. was not that they were bad, or not RQ,
but that they were published at the expense of Gloranthan stuff. As a
non-G DM, I don't think I need supplements like that: go and look up
books in Ye Local Library, if you want to know about Dark Ages Europe
(that's what I did for Germany). BUT TO STATE THAT THEY ARE NOT RQ,
WHEN THEY USE THE RQ RULE SYSTEM, IS STUPID!!!!!!!
Rant rant rave rave BLECH!
Anyway, to conclude: RuneQuest is a very good rule system for fantasy
gaming in pretty well any world you want to design (ok, so it has to
have a magic system separated into the 3 types - most worlds can fit
that mold). Just because the standard setting is Glorantha does not
mean we all have to use it. ICE does not force us to use Shadow World
or Middle Earth - most Rolemaster games I've played in use the DMs own
world. Come on: Subcreation is half the fun. Play whatever world you
like, just KEEP THE WOLRD OUT OF THE RULE SYSTEM.
Peter
---------------------
From: peterw@computer-science.manchester.ac.uk (Peter Wake)
Subject: Re: The Sunday RuneQuest Daily, 14 Feb 1993
Message-ID: <9302151446.AA07310@r2.cs.man.ac.uk>
Date: 15 Feb 93 14:46:40 GMT
My personal (God Learneresque) theory is that Orlanth is Argrath.
Here's what I think happened... Orlanth sees that the Red Goddess is
cheating and sidestepping Time by being part of it so he does a stormy
unpredictable thing. He decides to sidestep the compromise too. He
disguises himself as Argrath and breaks the compromise. This is not
so crazy - we read about Waha being involved in fights and stuff
apparantly during time - and he too is 'just some guy'.
Thus Orlanth mucks up time and they have to remake it - even stronger.
Thus the battle with the devil at the end.
Also Orlanth is known for his mastery of Dragons, so check out
Argrath, he has every attribute of Orlanth. No wonder Argrath is such
a neat heroquester. No wonder nobody can work out who his parents
are. No wonder he can work the banner of the EWF. No wonder he can
defeat all those Lunar demons in battle.
Argrath's defeat of the devil is what Orlanth has always been waiting
for, he missed the fight during the lightbringer's quest and his
brother fought the devil instead, but Orlanth knew all along that it
should have been him because he was to blame for it all by killing
Yelm, and also for letting Genert and his army be destroyed.
Well that's not how it is in my campaign, but I might use it another
time. I have a sneaking suspicion that it's what G.S. is thinking
more or less - but who can say? Who can say?
--
Peter Wake
---------------------
From: tzunder@cix.compulink.co.uk (Tom Zunder)
Subject: Glo/non-Glo,KoS,Rumours,A&E,FTP
Message-ID:
Date: 15 Feb 93 21:00:00 GMT
Greg is wrong, Greg is right, Greg is actually a good boy for making
sure it's intenally inconsistent. I remember the inteview he did with
GamesMaster International and the comments in TOTRM that he wanted to
end the obsessive need to follow the "one true way". Basically I think
most events up to 1621 are roughly as we all know, beyond that (and
before that if you want) you can do what you like. I suggest that Greg
make the Lunar book disagree even further with KoS.
Godlearner bit:
I can see such ideas on a secular Godlearner basis but why? Why not
have a real fantasy world? Obviously the gods are not unchangeable and
reflect their worshippeers, but I'd rather believe in a true core
factual reality to it all.
Non-Glo:
I repeat, most people I know play more non-Glo than Glo RQ. They like
the game and do not like the restricted feel of Glorantha. Many do not
want to have to gen up on Glo mythology, after all a Glo hack can
scare most casual visitors to death quite soon. They like the game
system and the feel. Some people half like Glorantha but half hate it
and reconstruct a similar but different world of their own. I like the
multiverse hopping of M Moorcock and I'd like to pop between tzunder
world 1 and Glorantha. I could use GURPS and I did run some GURPS
Glorantha, but I actually think RQ is a better system.
Rumours:
Let's create more rumours, shall we?
1: Hallgrim Ironfist, Storm Kahn of the Pol Joni has been possessed by
a fear spirit and captured by the Dark Sea clan of Morokanth. They say
he's been turned into a herdman. His colleague of some years, Darth
Jophayn is rumoured to have been contacted by the Storm Bulls to help
in a rescue atempt.
2: Belvani and Penta Goldbreath have become very friendly recently.
A&E
Thanks
FTP
I can support zip, arc, lzh but not zoo or tar. uue is okay.
@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@
Tom Zunder. A man who pays his own system time, Argan Argar damn it!
@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@
---------------------
From: STEVEG@ARC.UG.EDS.COM (Entropy needs no maintenance)
Subject: Running hard to catch up...
Message-ID: <01GUQXSGNZ9U00070K@UG.EDS.COM>
Date: 15 Feb 93 02:49:09 GMT
Cultists on their travels (or how long is your POWer cord?)
===========================================================
A question that has always puzzled me - your intrepid adventurers,
Humakti, Storm Bulls and the like having made home to hot to handle,
head off to Balazar to work through Griffin Mountain... Except, how
do they manage when they can't find a weekly worship service to
attend? In fact, any long-distance ventures must be severely hampered
by the lack of any spiritual states than "good standing" and "lapsed
to the point of dismissal".
In practice common for cults in the Sartar/Prax area, if you travel
only locally, you can probably expect to find a congregation in time
for the next seasonal holy day, but with a mixed party (e.g. one each
of Yelmalio, Yelorna, Orlanth, Gustbran, Babeester Gor, Odayla, to
take an actual example from play) those important days are comin up
every week or two, restricting travel ranges.
This seems to me like a better sort of topic for RQ4 to deal with than
tweaking damage bonuses.
The Ministry of Truth bulletin:-
==============================
"The Yelmalio cult was imported intentionally by the rulers of Pavis
in the year 875 to help against barbarian raiders" -- Cults of Prax
(Invader gods)
Comments on The RuneQuest Daily, Mon, 15 Feb 1993
RQ != Glorantha
===============
And the players do with the mechanics after buying them is their own
affair. After all, back in the late '70s there were a fair number of
folk who used RQ for the mechanics for their own worlds; and some heat
was raised over the "one true world" issue, with folk at pains to say
that playing RQ meant Glorantha as much as D&D meant Greyhawk or
Arduin Grimoire meant Arduin - which is to say only as much as you
want.
Note that Avalon Hill gets revenues from non-Gloranthan RQ products,
but not from any other similar system. The choice whether to publish
a given product would then be a separate marketing issue - would the
project make an adequate return on investment?
Personally, I feel the non-Gloranthan issue is a bit of a red herring
- the non-Glorantha players probably took or left RQ3 as they felt;
but to those who were more interested in Glorantha, the diversion into
rewriting the rules rather than supporting what was there proved more
of a disruption than the provision by Chaosium of related-system
material.
And surely there _was_ a failure in marketing information that
suggested that enough folk would buy a radically overhauled system (at
enormous expense) to create more revenuse than a supply of
supplementary $12 books or $18 boxes. Little market led to smaller
support and a speculative market in out of print material.
If we'd had Gloranthan material coming off the presses since '85 as
fast as it has been in the last six months, we could have laughed off
all the Eldorads and such like as just the inevitable duds one always
tends to get. They just wouldn't be an issue.
But then I think we'd have been better off with GURPS Glorantha in
'85, rather than RQ3 (after all GURPS worldbooks are often bought for
use with other systems, and we could have just used the system-free
material).
Time travel???
===============
> From: STEVEG@ARC.UG.EDS.COM (Entropy needs no maintenance)
> Subject: High&Low, A&E, Yelorna, Trivia
> Message-ID: <01GUQBWPM12A00074T@UG.EDS.COM>
> Date: 14 Feb 93 16:22:33 GMT
but I sent the message at Date: 15-FEB-1993 08:21:36.61 GMT!
==============================================================================
There now follows a miscellany of catch-up postings (some of which seem to
have been lost in the ether), and some other trivia at the end
About 30-50% of my postings seem to go astray, so I'm going to start a
policy of attaching to each response a re-transmit of anything > 48hrs
old which hasn't yet surface. I hope this doesn't result in too much
duplication (at least not much more than already happens with
quotations to give context to replies)
These are comments regarding "The Runequest Daily, Wed, 10 Feb 1993"
Horses
======
> I remember from Cults of Prax (I think), that horses can not get any
> nourishment from the plains of Prax - supposedly because they were not
> part of Waha's Compact.
I don't recall this (the implication being that the restrictions are
primarily social rather than myth-ecological); but it certainly seems
a reasonable extension at first sight, provided you restrict the Pol
Joni folk in the marchlands between Sartar and Prax (who are horse
riding, cattle herding folk) to the areas beyond the GodTime boundary
of Prax (the edge of the chaparral country where Oakfed had eaten the
trees).
The necessary side effect is that, apart from those cheating
Morokanth, none of the other sentient races(*) - ducks, dwarves,
elves, trolls - should be able to derive sustenance from Prax either.
Presumably Pavis' victory over Waha grants an exception for the city
of Pavis (as defined by the area in which is cult has power), thus
allowing the various denizens of the Rubble who would otherwise have
been starved out.
The thing that crocks an otherwise nice idea is the effect on wildlife
- birds, small mammals (the sort of things that are part of the desert
scenery, as well as the things that old-time RQ2ers like myself are
accustomed to being used for binding spirits into) also fall outside
the Waha list of beasts (at least as I interpret it the participants
are those beasts herded by the various tribes).
(*) I am prepared to expect dragonewts to be an exception to any
general rule.
RuneMetals
==========
> planetary association with Tin
My reasoning ran along the lines of Jupiter = storm-king = Orlanth;
thus Jupiter's metal in this world and Orlanth's in Glorantha whould
be as cognate as the two things labelled iron.
> did Tin do anything amusing under RQ2 rules?
At RQ2 nothing but iron had unique fancy abilities The utility was as
any enchanted rune metal = bronze+ability to hit lycanthropes
iron = enchanted rune metal+reduced ENC+double damage
vs trolls & aldryami
Sidestepping predestination
===========================
Comparing and contrasting Glorantha and the "official history"
thereof, with another privately created world of similar long
standing, and stature as an "official campaign world" for a published
RPG (though lacking the mythic quality), with its own imposed history
leads me to propose two ways of handling the dilemma posed by wanting
to do your own thing and at the same time following the official
material through significant historical events with widespread
repurcussions. (Out of deference to those displaying delicate
sensibilities, I refrain from mentioning specifics or drawing explicit
parallels.)
1) Accept it and stay close to the action -
Make Argrath the NPC about whom the characters gathered; but in your
world he might be little more than a figurehead when the time came for
the overthrow of the Lunar yoke - convenient because of his ancestry
as a token in the power game, and in whose name the actions of the
characters might be remembered - and in whose name the characters
might act after his safe installation on the throne.
In fact, the need to keep Argrath safe until he can be kicked upstairs
into the kingship provides a neat game-mechanical way to keep the PCs
in the limelight : Argrath is too valuable to take troll-hunting (or
whatever), stays at home, gathers skills & POW more slowly than his
entourage - perhaps doesn't ever heroquest, lacking the level of
abilities required.
2) The Hero Wars are someone else's problem (though they may trigger
other troubles)
How might we apply this tack to the Hero Wars? Well, we can interpret
some of the material from _King of Sartar_ quite narrowly, as
referring to local (Pelorian and/or Manirian at broadest extent)
disruptions - if Dragon Pass could remain shunned for centuries after
the Dragonkill, so a larger area, centred on Dragon Pass might be
after the fall of the Lunar Empire. All the chroniclers named in
_KoS_ might well be from a small, isolated (perhaps by magical? Lunar?
"fallout"(*)) pocket of civilsation in these shunned lands, the
Illiteracy merely a local breakdown.
In this view of things, we follow the history of some other part of
the world, to which the fall of some distant empire across the
mountains is but a herald's rumour (**); and the passing of Argrath's
entourage on his westfaring a significant episode - the characters
interacting with this when their paths happen to require interaction
with Lightbringer myth. There would be other mundane effects from the
movement of peoples and armies in Dragon Pass that would affect the
campaign area, but the focus might be any one of the other Hero Wars
period events discussed in the Glorantha/Genertela box, and which
would be regarded by the peoples of that area as the _real_ Hero Wars.
= = = = = =
(*) Lunar fallout - given the chaos taint of the Red moon, if great
chunks of this material (and many smaller fragments) fell to Earth,
the effects of the bombardment might well resemble that of saturation
nuclear warfare, at least locally (to which the 1950s-SF style of
mutant can be added, by virtue of chaotic emanations.
(**) Spot the motivation for looking at other parts of the world than
the distressingly uncivilised areas of Prax and Sartar, on which there
has been altogether too much emphasis.
= = = = =
These are comments regarding "The Runequest Daily, Fri, 05 Feb 1993"
Spells in Sun County
====================
> why do Invictus, Vega and all the Templars have Mobility when it is not a
> cult spell?
Probably it reflects the local playing style of the group of whose
campaign the pack is essentially a write-up - something along the
lines of "this is a useful spell, all the players think so, so
high-level NPCs will have thought so too..." (the usual problem in
generating such characters - how do you make them credible without
reinforcing the worst minimaxing of the most survivable PCs).
Maybe also, it's a relic of the RQ2/RQ3 transition - before RQ3 (may
it rot in hell for killing stone dead RQ at the height of its
popularity) almost all battle magic was open to everyone, and the
official conversion procedure doesn't do anything except detail spells
that have been withdrawn at the current release.
Ceremonies
==========
> "Also, on a side note, Garhound seemed to conveniently have a large number
> of earth-related priestesses and acolytes standing around. I assumed they
> came from other villages/areas, but the author also didn't speak to this.
> I assumed this to be reasonable, since, after all, the Lunar Governor is
> coming to what I first read as a podunk little festival. Then again, when
> I think about it, I guess it's not unlikely that the governor of New Mexico
> might show up at the Hillsboro Apple Festival or the governor of Texas
> heading down to Terlingua for the chili cook-off. Any comments?"
The idea of the Lunar (imposed from above) governor coming out to
"press the flesh" is FAR too late-20th century. The appearance of so
many significant personages in such a no-horse town is redolent of
being "for the purposes of the story". Provided it doesn't break the
suspension of disbelief, though, it can pass.
But what local personages might there be who would turn out?
A Sartar-derived culture might expect to have a priest of Orlanth or a
priestess of Ernalda in about the same position in the community as
the Christian priest of a Saxon settlement, so for the major ceremony
of the area, folk from any of the smaller villages about might well
turn up. It is plausible that a priest in the comparable position to
a bishop might make a visit at such a time - thus explaining an
Ernalda priestess from Pavis, perhaps even with a small retinue of Axe
maidens (Babeester Gor initiates).