Bell Digest v931009p1

From: RuneQuest-Request@Glorantha.Holland.Sun.COM (RQ Digest Maintainer)
To: RuneQuest@Glorantha.Holland.Sun.COM (Daily automated RQ-Digest)
Subject: RuneQuest Daily, Sat, 09 Oct 1993, part 1
Reply-To: RuneQuest@Glorantha.Holland.Sun.COM (RuneQuest Daily)
Sender: RuneQuest-Request@Glorantha.Holland.Sun.COM
Precedence: junk

The RuneQuest Daily and RuneQuest Digest deal with the subjects of
Avalon Hill's RPG and Greg Stafford's world of Glorantha.

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RuneQuest-Request@Glorantha.Holland.Sun.COM (Henk Langeveld)

---------------------

From: akuma@netcom.com (Steven E Barnes)
Subject: Re:  RuneQuest Daily, Fri, 08 Oct 1993, part 2
Message-ID: <9310080917.AA07842@netcom6.netcom.com>
Date: 7 Oct 93 19:17:08 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 1946


From: allan@tcrystal.gla.ac.uk (Allan Henderson)

>The only way then for a spirit to gain large ammounts of POW is to be 
>worshiped. Perhaps there is some lower limit on the amount of POW that a spirit
>can have before it can be worshiped, i.e. is a large enough landmark on the SP 
>for POW to be directed at it. After all if a spirit is severly lacking in POW 
>then why should anyone worhip it as the benefits it can bestow must be limited.

Well, I would assume that members of ancestor worship cults worship
many spirits, not just the ones that can give them stuff.

From: joe@sartar.toppoint.de (Joerg Baumgartner)

>This about the Short Lightbringers' Pilgrimage, an event _designed_ to 
>become a heroquest. So if you want to make a riddle contest between Joe 
>the Windlord and Bob the Sun Lord a Heroquest, they need to "harness 
>all of their magical power and potential". Just speaking the phrases 
>won't do it.

Interesting...  So what would be the benefit, besides status,
of winning a riddling Heroquest?  Also, I would assume that such
a quest can only be performed under certain circumstances.  You
can't have a Heroquest with the same guy you meet on the road 
everyday.

>Just into the off: How likely are female sorcerers/wizards in Western 
>societies (Hrestoli, Rokari)? What would be their role?

I was under the impression that the Western societies were
paternalistic.  As such, female sorcerors would be frowned upon.
Perhaps female sorcerors become "Witches".

>>>Now, I've always seen people`s spirits as existing on 
>>>the spirit plane at the same time, which I think's the implicit assumption 
>>>of RQ. 
>
>>Curiously, when we discussed this very point within our RQ group, we came to 
>>the conclusion that spirits attached to the mundane plane don't exist on 
>>the spirit plane.
>
>Seconded.

Clearly, disembodied spirits can attack embodied spirits (i.e. people),
therefore, all spirits must be visible from the spirit plane.  For
this reason, I would disagree with the guy who ruled that a spirit
could not attack a spirit that had been bound into an object.  We've
also played that spirits bound into objects could view the spirit
plane as well.

From: watson@computing-science.aberdeen.ac.uk (Colin Watson)

>A *group* of PC spirits who are willing to cooperate could be quite powerful - 
>they could gang up on solitary Spirit entities. I'm not sure of the mechanics
>for multiple spirit combats. Anyone got any ideas?
>I think spirit alliances could make interesting politics on the SP. Why do
>spirits have to be solitary? I think intelligent spirits would band together
>for mutual security etc.

Well, our GM pulled a nasty spirit tag-team on us once (some Lunars
sent them after us; they seemed a little peeved about what happened
to their Moon Boat).  Basically, they held back and attacked one at
a time.  Once of them knew Dispell Magic, to get rid of Spirit Block.
Hmmm...  Can a spirit use Spirit Shield against an embodied opponent?

>[BTW I think bunny spirits would be as non-aggressive as corporeal bunnies:-)]

Unless you are a grass spirit...


From: DScott@snail.demon.co.uk (David Scott)

>>A couple more apparent errors in the Dorastor book: There's a Humakti 
>>(Platewalker) listed as having the Berserk spell.

>Is that a problem? Take a look in Tales of the Reaching Moon issue 5 (If you 

Well, it's hard to be honorable, when you are berserk.  Also, the
Storm Bull version that I remember was twice as effective vs creatures
of chaos.  Since Humakt isn't associated with chaos fighting powers,
this would seem in appropriate.

From: T.S.Baguley@open.ac.uk (Thom Baguley)

>I'm not keen on the current spirit plane and POW gain rules. I would prefer it
>if POW gain were restricted to the following (these are very rough ideas):
>
>1) reducing a spirit's MP to zero. This allows you to either steal a spell or
>attempt to steal POW (as per POW gain rules i.e. 5% for a spirit) or
>possess/bind a victim (as appropriate). If the latter option is taken the gain

I've always wondered why people can steal spells from Spell Spirits,
but the spirits cannot steal them back...  (Of course, I also think
the RQIII Spell Spirit rules are silly)

I'm a little worried about the idea of stealing POW though.  Perhaps 
allowing them to gain MPs from defeated spirits (except the defeated 
spirit won't have any MPs left; oh well).

>SPIRIT MOVEMENT
>
>I am also tempted to ignore the POW = movement rule on the spirit plane (is
>that the current rule? I'm not sure) ... why shouldn't a small fast spirit be
>able to `run' away from a big slow one. I'm sure Vrok spirits think they are
>faster than turtle spirits.

Sounds like a rating in the Mobility Rune to me...

>THANATARI RITUALS
>
>... which starts me off on a tangent. I just reread the very gross Thanatar
>writeup. I wanted to check how Thanatari heads regained special cult divine
>magic (answer: when the priest worships at a shrine they get their spells back
>too). I noticed that several Thanatari in AH publications have Humakti and
>other Rune Level heads. How? Humakti Rune Lords DI on 1D10. If their power is
>over 11 they automatically succeed. I know Humakti wouldn't teleport out, but I
>believe they might be able to prevent the ritual in several ways (use your
>imagination). 

Sounds like somebody screwed up.  Unless I'm mistaken, a Thanatari
Head is a form of undead.  At least in RQ2, a Humakt initiate cannot
be turned into an undead.  But this reminds me of the Thanatari Basalisk 
Head our GM left lying around for us to find...

>Besides Humakt must really hate Thanatari rituals. The same goes
>for other Rune Levels with 1D10 DI. One explanation I have is that the Humakti
>was rendered unconscious or captured using Control/Dominate Human (or similar).

Slave collars are also handy for blocking those pesky DIs.

-steve


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From: mstrong@cix.compulink.co.uk (Mike Strong)
Subject: Re: HeroQuests
Message-ID: 
Date: 8 Oct 93 12:21:09 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 1947


In-Reply-To: <9310080616.AA18156@glorantha.Holland.Sun.COM>

Joerg Baumgartner quotes Greg Stafford on the subject of HeroQuests:

>they need to "harness all of their magical power and potential"

Well, thank goodness for that! Whilst I agree, in principle, with many 
people's comments about the strong mythical influence on Gloranthan 
life, I still feel there has to be more to a HeroQuest than just acting 
out any of a cult's god's mythical activities. I mean to say, many of a 
god's activities may have been really 'mundane'; for example, they might 
have had a drink once. The Lay HeroQuesting Principle would suggest that 
any follower of that god was performing a HeroQuest *whenever* he had a 
drink, whilst the Strong HeroQuesting Principle requires a *lot* more 
effort on the drinker's behalf. Without the effort that the SHP 
requires, taking a drink is merely a ritual or simple religious 
observance carried out by the cult member.

Mike

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From: eosgg@raesp-farn.mod.uk (Geoff Gunner)
Subject: Chaos and Magic
Message-ID: <9310081614.AA09526@raesp-farn.mod.uk>
Date: 8 Oct 93 16:14:58 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 1948

Joerg says:
   I disagree. Chaos keeps leaking in, and keeps annihilating magic. 
   Tapping (creatures or myths) diminishes magical potential permanently. 
   There must be some continuous source of magic within Time.

Why?  Does that mean 'Law' increases magic ?  Most fantasy stuff I've read
would place magic as stemming from chaos.  I can't think of any good reason why
this should be one way or the other for Glorantha;  Chaos and Law have nowt to
do with it.

Geoff.

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From: f6ri@midway.uchicago.edu (charles gregory fried)
Subject: zebras 'n' such
Message-ID: 
Date: 8 Oct 93 16:05:57 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 1949

Greg Fried here.

The SB and the Zebra-rider:
Opportunity melee is one way to handle this.  Alternatively, I use a rule
whereby a character can try to make a 'hasty' attack before his proper SR. 
For each SR 'early' the attack is made, subtract 10% (or 5% if you think
reasonable) from the attack skill.
===
Colin (I think):
You ask whether gods' physical manifestation, such as Yelm as the Sun,
violates the Compromise, since they still obtrude upon the world.  It seems
to me that the Compromise guaranteed each diety's dominion over his or her
domain, and that for many gods, this domain is a very real thing (Sun, Earth,
Storm, Winter, etc).  So, Yelm killing you with Sunstroke is legal under the
COmpromise.  What the gods cannot do is, ON THEIR OWN, employ the powers of
their domain to rearrange the balance of divine power.  Only their mundane
worshipers may do this.  Or the Red Goddess!
===
Allan:
In your discussion of spirits on the SP getting really huge, you touch upon
an issue that really bothers me and that I have raised in the past, to no
avail.  You mention that a spirit with 1000 POW will have trouble finding
another spirit in the range 990-1010 to get a POW gain check from. Notice an
absolutely absurd implication of the current rules: an entity of POW 1000
will always (excluding statistical miracles) lose to a being of POW 1010 --
even though there is only a 1% difference between them!!!  This makes NO
sense to me.  It is a problem even at relatively low levels of POW (tho
levels never attained by players.... say, 50 vs 60 POW).  What this tells me
is that table for the Resistence Roll was created for the RQ game with
creatures in mind who all have POW (and indeed other STATS) within a fairly
restricted range.  The system breaks down once you get values much above 30. 
Any ideas for fixes that get at the proportional values of STATS?  I have
one, but it is a fairly radical departure from RQ, so I will post it only if
interest is shown...

GF out.

---------------------

From: watson@computing-science.aberdeen.ac.uk (Colin Watson)
Subject: handouts; magic; bull
Message-ID: <9310081631.AA07666@condor>
Date: 8 Oct 93 16:31:51 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 1950


Seems my email problem fixed itself. The Dailys came flooding into my
mail spool last night...

____________
David Dunham (handouts):
>I gleefully give out all the handouts applicable when running Griffin
>Island (I think I've used all but two so far). Yes, they may give out more
>info than has been played, but I believe in abstraction. The characters
>have more time to learn this stuff than we do to play it, after all. And
>when it's common knowledge, they've grown up with it, and know (if not
>understand) all the nuances.

I agree with this too. Its easy to make the mistake of thinking a character
doesn't know something because the player is unaware of it. Detailed handouts
help to avoid this. (My only problem is when the players know more than I
do about what's going on ie. when *I* haven't read the handouts fully myself.
This has caught me out a few times:-)
Personally I'd rather see more handouts and fewer gross stats in scenarios.
____________
Thom Baguley (spirits etc):
>I'm not keen on the current spirit plane and POW gain rules. I would prefer it
>if POW gain were restricted to the following (these are very rough ideas):
[...Nice idea about stealing POW *or* spell...]

I like this idea for getting around the problem of POW gains when you learn
spells. But it still means that big spirits get huge as fast as ever.

>I am also tempted to ignore the POW = movement rule on the spirit plane 

Me too. I think, if anything, movement should be based on INT. (POW-only
spirits wouldn't move around - they are the landscape).
_________________
Joerg Baumgartner:
>>Magic
>>I think the path to enriching magic is to develop slow magics, like the 
>>travelling omen ritual in RQA2. Slow and interesting magics which are 
>>cheapin MP or POW to cast, but take time and preparation. Some spirit 
>>magics are probably wrong, heal is too powerful, but like the GL cults, 
>>we can't rebuild RQ without them.
>
>Tom gets the big Y award for the greatest truth of this daily!

I agree that slow magics are more Gloranthan (and more atmospheric in general)
but do they suit RQ? Some of the grossest abuses of the game system can come
from Ritual & Long Duration magics (which are the closest thing to slow magics
at the moment). RQ is, after all, geared towards Adventurers going on
Adventures; not brooding magicians spending months preparing immense spells.
I'd *like* to see slow magicks, but you'd have to be careful to mainatain
game balance in implementing the rules. Like I said before, the greatest
tool which RQ-munchkins have at their disposal is *time*. If the "disadvantage"
of a spell is only that it takes *time* to prepare/cast, then a munchkin would
happily write off that game-time to gain the advantage.
And I fear that those Published NPCs, whom we all know and love, would
get grosser still.

>I'd like to pursue my theory of gradual transition:
[...stuff about time gradually fading as the God Plane is approached via SP...]

Y'know, initially I hated the idea of a gradual transition from Time to
No-Time. I thought: "either yer within Time, or yer not; there's no half-way".
But I'm almost beginning to change my mind...

I considered Time on a graph:

Normal Time flows Up the way.          ^ Objective ("Real") Time
God Time flows across the way.         |
Usually they are completely            |
separate temporal dimensions.          |
                               --------+-------> Subjective ("God") Time
                                       |
                      (I think I might have seen a similar graph elsewhere,
                       but I can't remember...  anyone recognise it?)

If, somehow, you can make your personal time-track sway from the normal
(vertical) time, towards the horizontal then, in effect, Objective time
slows down for you and God-Time starts to exist for you.
When your time-track reaches horizontal, Objective time stops and you're
fully in God Time. You can reach any point in God Time from any point
in Objective time (and, maybe, vice versa).
Does this make sense to anyone?
My only problem is that you might approach an "event horizon" (as in a
black hole) which would mean that observers in Objective time would
never see you reach God Time (until the end of (Real) Time) and that
when you returned you might find that the universe had ended already...

Still, after knotting my brain with this concept, I'm happier with your
gradual-transition idea.
(But I think the principle should apply to the MP as well as the SP).

>Since the God Planes are outside of Time's influence, I'd suggest that the 
>subjective time passes a lot faster than objective (material plane) time.

I'm confused again. Does this mean that you're younger or older when you
return?

>>Also, I'm of the opinion that the God Plane has Substance which the SP 
>>lacks. Real combat works on the God Plane because the participants have 
>>substance - it's meaningless on the Spirit Plane because everything there 
>>is ethereal (lacking SIZ=substance). Ok, spirits on the SP can have 
>>Appearance: the SP doesn't have to be gray and featurless, but neither will 
>>it have all the features of the Mundane Plane.
>
>Try Illusion spell effects: a temporal reality is created, complete 
>with appearance, size etc. The deity maintains the reality inside its 
>realm. On the usual heroquest the reality is created by the ritual 
>spell. The absence of time makes maintaining temporal effdects easy, of 
>course...

Not convinced. I don't think even illusiory substance can exist on the
spirit world. (Almost as if the Spirit Plane lacks the third spacial dimension
which allows volume/mass to exist.) If you cast a substance illusion
on the SP then I think it would either fail or it would pop out in another
plane (either MP or GP). Any temporary "reality" created in such a way would
no longer be part of the Spirit World.

>>'Course, you could say that everything on the Mundane Plane has an underlying 
>>Magical Structure. The magical structure of the Living is a Spirit. The 
>>magical structure of the Non-living is something less than a spirit but still 
>>magical in some way.  (I'd draw a real-world analogy with Organic and 
>>Inorganic chemistry; but I ain't no chemist.) 
>Well, I am a chemist - Inorganic and Organic is mostly a matter of 
>definition, and may well be transformed from one to the other. (There 
>was the famous transformatiion of ammonium carbonate into urea (sp?) 
>which proved that no "spark of life" was needed to produce organic 
>matter from inorganic matter.) For the same reason I think your 
>comparison is apt, because enough of substance not-yet-spirit may form 
>a real spirit, especially if enhanced from some source or the other, 
>like worship, or runic ties. Think of Rune Metals.

Well said. If we can define the "not-yet-spirit" part we should be closer to
understanding the fundemental nature of Gloranthan magic... heh, heh.
...

>>I still prefer the idea that spirits are dissolved and recycled. I postulate
>>that the total magical energy in the universe is constant, not increasing.
>
>I disagree. Chaos keeps leaking in, and keeps annihilating magic. 
>Tapping (creatures or myths) diminishes magical potential permanently. 
>There must be some continuous source of magic within Time.

I've mentioned this before but I'll say again: as far as Tapping is concerned
I consider Characteristics and Magic (MPs) to be unified - two forms of the
same thing. This is why magic can be used to create (or restore)
characteristics and also why MPs can be derived from characteristics (via Tap).
But I'd say that a *lot* of magic is required to create permanent
characteristics. (I think the Tap spell is inefficient, ie. a lot of the
potential MPs bleeds off into the spirit plane: the amount yielded to the
caster is only a fraction of what the characteristic is really worth). I don't
think Tap destroys anything - it just changes the form.

Also, when any spell is cast, the MPs used are not destroyed IMO. The process
of spell casting is one of *transferral* of magical energy: the MPs which
power the spell are converted into some other form (and for temporal spells,
when the duration ends, they flow back to the spirit plane where they can
be recovered over time by any creature with POW).
This is my Unified Theory of Magick. :-)

And I don't see that Chaos really destroys any more magic than it creates.
But maybe I'm Illuminated. ):^>

__________
Tom Zunder:
>I think a Storm Bull dropping a rock on a chaos monster rates as a 
>HeroQuest. How mythically important depends on two things;
>How big a monster
>How big a rock 
>:-)

And I guess it's even more significant if he waits for someone else to drop
the rock, and then claims the credit himself. ):^)
___
CW.

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From: crawford@clarknet.clark.net (From Beyond)
Subject: RQ Digest
Message-ID: 
Date: 8 Oct 93 09:11:08 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 1951

Hello,

I got your address from "Tales of the Reaching Moon."  I am very 
interested in anything that has to do with RQ. Please send me some info 
on RQ Digest.

I'm new to modeming and to Internet and to "netsurfing" so any advice on 
how to access RQ info and discussions on the Nets would be appreciated.

Thanks for taking the time to address this mail.

Sincerely,

David Schubert



---------------------

From: nrobinso@sirius.UVic.CA (Neil Robinson)
Subject: Yanafal == Humakt?
Message-ID: <37418.nrobinso@sirius.uvic.ca>
Date: 8 Oct 93 18:23:35 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 1952

David Scott brought up a point about deities from different pantheons
NOT being from the same single source.

> The seven mothers are just shadows of the real thing - the comparisons
> is a conveniant model to aid our thinking. This idea can be followed
> through other pantheons - but I sure that most people wouldn't say that
> just as Orlanth, Red Goddess & Yelm are the heads of their respective
> pantheons they are the same or Yanafal = Humakt = Polaris.

I disagree.  You are trying to mix two different concepts, the role in
the pantheon, and the deity's area of influence.  Humakt and Yanafal
are both death gods, and are worshipped as such.  In my mind, they
are just facets of the death rune/concept/whatever.  Their differences
are based upon the cultural differences of the two areas.  Look at a
Humakt worshipper from the west (Kingdom of War).

Now I agree that Yelm and Orlanth are not the same.  One is Storm and
the other is the Sun.  Yelm is worshipped in many different aspects
across Glorantha.  The reason that Yelm is the head of the pantheons
in, say, Pent, is completely cultural.  Different cultures put different
importance on the deities, or rather the forces they represent.  The
Egyptians considered the Sun to be the pantheon head, and the Greeks
gave that title to Zeus.

Oh, and has anyone thought that Humakt is 'THE' death god merely because
of the Orlanthi bias in much RQ writing?  Of course the Orlanthi consider
THEIR death god to be supreme, much like calling Orlanth king of the
gods. :-)  My graserlander would disagree completely....
Neil Robinson              | "Never underestimate the power of human
nrobinso@sirius.uvic.ca    |  stupidity." - L. Long
2996 Dysart Rd. Victoria B.C. V9A 2K2     (604) 385-1642