From: RuneQuest-Request@Glorantha.Holland.Sun.COM (RQ Digest Maintainer)
Sender: RuneQuest-Request@Glorantha.Holland.Sun.COM (RQ Digest Maintainer)
Organization: Lankhor Mhy and Associates
To: RuneQuest@Glorantha.Holland.Sun.COM (Daily automated RQ-Digest)
Reply-To: RuneQuest@Glorantha.Holland.Sun.COM (RuneQuest Daily)
Subject: RuneQuest Daily, Sat, 11 Dec 1993, part 1
Message-ID:
Precedence: junk
X-RQ-ID: Intro
This is the RuneQuest Daily Bulletin, a mailing list on
the subjects of Avalon Hill's RPG and Greg Stafford's
world of Glorantha. It is sent out once per day in digest
format.
More details on the RuneQuest Daily and Digest can be found
after the last message in this digest.
---------------------
From: STEVEG@ARC.UG.EDS.COM (Steve Gilham Entropy requires no maintenance)
Subject: Re: DI from the Invisible God
Message-ID: <01H6AN9UVKLU008I17@UG.EDS.COM>
Date: 9 Dec 93 17:37:12 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 2603
>Why wouldn't the Invisible God provide DI?
If his worship provides no standard Divine Magic, and the
worshippers are sorcerers, not priests, there is no obvious
reason why DI should become available.
---------------------
From: akuma@netcom.com (Steven E Barnes)
Subject: Invisible God DI
Message-ID: <199312101048.CAA21536@mail.netcom.com>
Date: 9 Dec 93 18:48:08 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 2604
From: sandyp@idcube.idsoftware.com (Sandy Petersen)
>>Yow... This is a major change from standard Malkionism. I assume
>>that standard Invisible God worship doesn't provide DI, since it
>>isn't mentioned in Gods of Glorantha.
>What is the major change? They've always had Solace, and they've
>always had sorcery. Why wouldn't the Invisible God provide DI? It's
>not mentioned in GoG, but neither is anyone else's possession of DI,
>yet no one doubts Aldrya's or Tsankth's access. Mostal and Nysalor
>are another matter, of course, what with being dead and all.
One of these things is not like the others...
Just to quibble, Aldrya / etc, are ordinary divine cults. The GoG
writeup for the Invisible God has no information about initiates,
priests, or Rune Lords, and states that it provides no "divine magic."
It does mention that "it's priests are also sorcerors", but later
explains that worship is accomplished thru the Worship Invisible God
sorcery spell. So there is nothing in this description that would
lead me to believe they get _Divine_ Intervention, since I have
always associated it with _Divine_ magic.
Then there is the description of the god: "... He is the god beyond
the gods. Though he is seemingly impersonal and impartial, he
is the supreme and only god of the Malkioni." This lends further
weight to the interpretation that the cult lacks DI.
I'm hardly the only person to reach this conclusion, so perhaps
you should clarify this point in future publications.
Having said that, let me thank you for the useful information.
Also, if Malkoni get DI, do they have a form of Divination?
-steve
---------------------
From: JARDINE@RMCS.CRANFIELD.AC.UK
Subject: Eldarad
Message-ID: <9312101409.AA29089@Sun.COM>
Date: 10 Dec 93 12:53:00 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 2605
Ref: All sorts of flak about Eldarad from MOB and others...
I happen to know Chris Watson's brother Phil quite well.
He has some interesting comments about this product...
1) He hates the product (claims that the few good things in it were his ideas) and the rest of the rubbish his brothers.
2) He regards his brother in much the same light since he *borrowed* his Cults of Terror and other RQII stuff.
3) He did quite a bit of editting for the product which was baddly needed AND
NOT USED!
Now that I have added fuel to a family feud I will also bare my soul.
I think the barter system is neat, but it has some horrendous loop-holes for
smart PC traders who intend to leave Eldarad and return to civilization
(Pavis?!). Gold and gems are really undervalued in Eldarad and a sneaky
player who can set up a shrine to Mastakos and use Guided Teleportation in
and out of Eldarad could get really rich really fast! I know that my God
Learning Issaries Priestess is considering just that... But, hell, what
do you expect from a scheming, blood-sucking, Issaries, GL, bastardess!
(Well, I would expect joining multiple cults and dabbling in sorcery too!)
Other than the above and a few other sporadic nice touches I think Eldarad
is basically boring (I know that the GM who attempted to run it for us had
to write ALL the scenario material himself as the stuff with it was crap).
Even then he got bored with it after one weekend and our characters have
been stuck in limbo ever since...
Well for me Eldarad was boring, but I am sure that somewhere out there someone
must like it (a munchkin maybe?).
BTW Phil tells me that there was far more in the manuscript than was actually
published. So maybe it is a good thing that we have all slagged it off so
much or we might have had Eldarad II (Argh)!
-----
Lewis
-----
---------------------
From: jclannom@mathlab.mtu.edu (Joe Lannom)
Subject: A request for praxian Oasis info
Message-ID: <9312101540.AA03467@mathlab.mtu.edu>
Date: 10 Dec 93 15:40:56 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 2606
'lo folks.
I've been reading the list now for about two months (finally got
caught up in the back dailies, whew!!) and would like to ask a favor.
I'm just now starting my first ever runequest campaign as a GM, and
I've only played a handful of times, enough to know I like the system
and love the world. I REALLY appreciate Sandy's (and other's) little
info bits on Glorantha, but I'm sketchy on lots (read, most) of the
background / gloranthan things.
I've got RQ2 versions of Cop, CoT, Troll Pack (I love these guys!
8-), and the borderlands (somewhere...) and the RuneQuest book
itself.
Right now my players are guarding a caravan thats going through the
plains of prax (timely info on the tribes, sandy!) trading with the
tribes. What I'm most curious about are the oasis... most of them
I've described as being your typical scrub/arid "truck" stop. Lots
of people passing through, but not many who live there, hence no real
structures. Can anyone give me some information on them like their
history, why they're named what they are, any cult affiliations that
are specific to certain oasis (I know they're all holy to Eirithra).
Um, if people don't want to clutter up the dailies with 'basic' stuff
I accept e-mail enthusiastically, but I think (hope... I don't wanna
be the only newbie 8-) there's at least one other person out there
that would like to see it too.
Here's an adventure idea, maybe I can add something to the list
instead of just picking everyone's brains:
A troll who's started an acting company, but hasn't quite gotten the
idea that the audience should know its a play before hand, and most
audiences don't like to be included in a play where the weapons are
real and the actors are attacking them. Trollkin make terrible
actors... and the party usually isn't very hip to paying for tickets
after the fact.
Joe Lannom
(jclannom@mathlab.mtu.edu)
---------------------
From: watson@computing-science.aberdeen.ac.uk (Colin Watson)
Subject: Re: RuneQuest Daily, Fri, 10 Dec 1993, part 1
Message-ID: <9312101603.AA02977@condor>
Date: 10 Dec 93 16:03:04 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 2607
___
MOB replied about Eldarad:
>CW>For the record, I really liked "Eldarad". I've only played it (not read it)
>CW>so my impression could be more due to the work of the GM & the antics of
>CW>the players rather than the material as published
>
>As I consider Eldarad not only the worst RQ supplement, but one
>of the worst RPG products ever published, I can only assume this was the case.
Have you played it?
I've noticed several people have a low opinion of Eldarad which conflicts
with my experience in playing it. I wonder if others who have played it
think it's so bad.
>CW>the GM who ran it for us considers it to be his favourite RQ
>CW>publication.
>
>How many does he own? One?
Actually, he owns the half that I don't have. This includes Sun County and
Dorastor.
But he's not a Glorantha fan.
>CW>I get the impression that most of the published Gloranthan stuff is really
>CW>nice to read, but only so-so to play.
>
>Whereas Eldarad was so-so to read (putting it kindly), and for you, nice to
>play.
Which, unless I miss the point of RPGs completely, is preferable for
a scenario.
>In my opinion, Eldarad marks the absolute nadir of RQ, brought out under
>Ken Rolston's predecessor, who, through no fault of his, found himself in
>charge of a product line he had never played...
>...here's a review from the time, and a letter to AH
>from a disgruntled purchaser:
[...review & letter deleted...]
Curiously, it appears that neither the reviewer nor the letter-writer had
actually played in the scenario either.
>To finish off, 20% of our respondents to the TALES questionnaire said
>they burnt their copies of it!
A rather extremist reaction. What was the question I wonder?
Sounds like a large proportion of the readership are fanatical Gloranthan
fundamentalists. "It's Gloranthan, therefore it is inherently Good" and
vice versa. There's a lot of it about.
I think maybe the reason my GM liked Eldarad is that he is prepared to
make major changes to any published material before he slots it into his
campaign. He does this with Gloranthan material too, so the fact that
Eldarad is non-Gloranthan doesn't make any difference to him. Most Gloranthan
material needs a *lot* of conversion to fit a non-Gloranthan campaign, and
it loses much of its quality in the process; stripping out the superfluous
campaign background in Eldarad is less costly.
I reckon if he was used to running a Gloranthan campaign then he too might
consider it unthinkable that GMs should have to modify published material
before they use it.
I'll speak to my GM about this at the weekend...
___
CW.
---------------------
From: ngl28@rz.uni-kiel.d400.de
Subject: "RE: SANDY
Message-ID: <5617*_S=ngl28_OU=rz_PRMD=uni-kiel_ADMD=d400_C=de_@MHS>
Date: 10 Dec 93 19:04:58 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 2608
Sandy Petersen in X-RQ-ID: 2601
>Colin Watson asks:
>>Is there a Gloranthan version of a base (i.e, alkali) or is this not
>>part of Gloranthan alchemy?
>I'm sure Glorantha has quicklime and lye, for making soap if nothing
>else. I personally am of the opinion that the "acid" in Glorantha
>used for damaging your opponents is as likely to be a base as a true
>acid, or even a vesicant of some sort. Most people wouldn't
>distinguish between corrosive liquids. I still think that gorp "acid"
>is not the same chemical thing as true acid, but some other
>dissolving substance.
I wish you had said so before calling the gorp fluid acid. If this is
an entropic liquid, destroying the structure of anything exposed to it, it
might work. Thus Gorp "acid" ought to be neither acidic nor basic, only
eating away the indicator if anyone happened to apply some on gorp.
This would be a handy tool in warfare, though - corrupts any substance but
truestone, adamant and (possibly) enchanted rune metals, a great thing to
use against battlements or their defenders. Where is the Lunar gorp
catapulteers regiment before Whitewall?
Of course this is furthering chaos, and Orlanthi or Praxians would have to
overcome scruples before inflicting gorp on non-chaotic opponents. In Nomad
Gods, the Praxian tribes seem to be able to overcome these scruples fairly
easily...
>So far, only a handful of Yelmalion quester has been able to defeat
>Orlanth, Zorak Zoran, AND Inora. Of those, all are believed to have
>fallen to the chaos parasites, and thus are totally extinguished from
>existence. If anyone ever managed to beat all four of the obstacles,
>they'd probably end up with a different reward than what Yelmalio
>received, and instead of immortality, get something else.
So that's how Yelmalio attained Godhood?
I wonder when I will understand this cult. My in no way authoritative
hypothesis right now is that the Yelmalio cult the Praxian Sun Dome temple
stems from is indeed the result of early second age Theyalans from south
Peloria (nowadays known as Lunar Provinces) adopting this exotic
Aldryami war god to get an edge against the Grayland trolls Arkat imposed
on them. They (maybe) somehow merged his cult with that of the Orlanthi
cult of the ripening sun, Elmal, the Steward who held Orlanth's court
during his absence. Anyway, they drove the trolls back into Dagori Inkarth,
and only under the hubris of Dara Happan Yelmic influences they mustered
the Golden Horde and overstepped themselves.
(Then in the EWF reign, cross-fertilization between the races was possible
- see Pavis - and maybe this occured also with cults.)
The Sartar Sun Dome temple was (re) settled in the reign of Tarkalor, a
land grant to a character called Monrogh who somehow usurped the position
of Yelmalio's spirit of retribution via God Learnerish heroquesting.
How wrong am I? Sandy? Nick? anyone else?
Steven Barnes asks:
>>why does the Empire tolerate it, if Orlanth worship is outlawed?
>Technically, it's not "true" Orlanth worship, and the Empire really
>doesn't tolerate it too much. It is accepted in the way that the
>Soviet Union used to accept Russian Orthodox believers. If any
>important Carmanian leader ever professed the Aeolian Heresy, he
>would be quietly kidnapped, killed, brainwashed, or replaced, and
>they know this.
So in occupied Heortland the Aeolians may continue worshipping
Orlanth the Saviour? Or is this just the Lunar policy in Carmania?
For clarification: The Aeolian thoughts I'm going to post as soon as I'm
finished with reediting them and getting Free INT 7 out were meant for
Heortland only. I wouldn't dare to say anything about the Henotheist church
in Otkorion, Ralios, which ought to be rather closely reelated in dogma.
Nick made sure to let me know that the Heortling Aeolians had no contact
whatsoever with the cult of Invisible Orlanth. While I still doubt the
absoluteness of that statement (Queens Regiment are the most militaristic
Carmanian knights after all, thus likely have their measure of knights and
probably also one or two field chaplains from that cult, and likely have
operated in the war against Richard the Tigerhearted), I agree that there
is no clerical exchange between these two branches.
>What is the major change? They've always had Solace, and they've
>always had sorcery. Why wouldn't the Invisible God provide DI? It's
>not mentioned in GoG, but neither is anyone else's possession of DI,
>yet no one doubts Aldrya's or Tsankth's access. Mostal and Nysalor
>are another matter, of course, what with being dead and all.
My proposal: If the Western culture is to reflect certain aspects of
medieval christianity, then the divine intervention takes place through
saints rather than through the Invisible God. (This might be different for
saints themselves, but that's why they are saints.)
Norwegian saint king Olaf was made responsible for nearly all the miracles
which occureds in Scandinavia for three hundred years after his death at
Stiklestad. Similar practise was common about the Anglosaxons. I doubt any
Anglosaxon faced with a monster would have thought of invoking God directly
when Saint Columba showed the (heroquest?) path when he banished the
monster of Loch Ness, and could be invoked much easier. And a pilgrimage
to Iona was much shorter than to Rome or Jerusalem.
Aside:
Solace: the troll deity of Solace is Xiola Umbar. How do trollish Arkati
interpret her role vs the Invisible God?
Joerg Baumgartner
ngl28@rz.uni-kiel.d400.de
---------------------
From: ngl28@rz.uni-kiel.d400.de
Subject: "RE: ELDARAD, ENCYCLOPAEDIA
Message-ID: <5618*_S=ngl28_OU=rz_PRMD=uni-kiel_ADMD=d400_C=de_@MHS>
Date: 10 Dec 93 19:06:35 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 2609
MOB in X-RQ-ID: 2602
Says a lot of truths about Eldarad. Still, I'd like to back Colin's
impression: Eldarad was so generic that I could ignore anything I didn't
like, change the rest so that it fitted into my campaign world, and now it
marks the northern end of a crusade against chaos on my game world where
the southern end is the Griffin Peninsula, likewise treated.
In fact I would have liked to see more generic RQ material easy to fit into
my Alternate Earth/Alternate Glorantha campaign. It took me one year of
intense studies (and the incentive to do so from this list) to feel vaguely
fit to GM in Glorantha. I'll start to do so early next year, and I intend
to run a group consisting of mixed experience players - one old Gloranthan,
one or two experienced roleplayerss from previous campaigns, and one or two
total newcomers to either RQ or even rpgs.
I feel that it takes a PHD in Gloranthan lore to really master the world,
and a BA to GM in it.
---------------------
Jonathan Eyre in X-RQ-ID: 2596
>Subject: Runequest Encyclopedia
>First off, all of the stuff should be in
>ASCII, so as as many people as possible can use it.
I admit to be ignorant of hypertext files, but I would not mind reading
some gibberish between the informations if this gibberish enables my
machine to quickly find references and possibly cross-references.
I heard that there exists a version of the PD editor EMACS which has some
hypertext facilities. To my knowledge, this editor exists for every system
on the market today (though not necessarily in that special version). I
know we have some data-wizards lurking here who might be able to find and
port the version I mean.
>Secondly, what
>about using a similar structure to that of the guitar tab lists on
>Nevada.edu? These have a list of directories from A to Z, with
>subdirectories for artists. Since the entries for the encyclopedia
>will be along similar lines, perhaps this might be an idea. It'll all
>be online, so you can find and print out the bits you want, and for
>those who want a whole printed copy, they can do that too.
No. Most entry are far too short to justify this immense waste of of
storage capacity - I mean a lot of entries may consist of say 80 bytes. If
each entry had its own file, several megabytes of storage woould be wasted
if handled conventionally. Which is why I look for a method to conveniently
handle either one or a bunch of sequential files.
>There could also be a NEW.THIS.WEEK directory, so that people can keep
>their printed version up to date without having to scan the
>directories for new arrivals. Whaddya think?
Working mostly offline, and having limited online access (e.g. no ftp from
my private account, and no utilities on my university account), I can see
the merits of this idea for those people working online, but I see no way I
could actively use the remote file. The idea about the NEW.THIS.WEEK
directory looks good, though.
Oops, sorry for this computer talk. Maybe we should open a mailing list for
discussion and DEVELOPMENT of the encyclopedia project, where also
intermediate results could be posted. Opinions?
Joerg Baumgartner
ngl28@rz.uni-kiel.d400.de
---------------------
From: nrobinso@sirius.UVic.CA (Neil Robinson)
Subject: RQ Index
Message-ID: <36665.nrobinso@sirius.uvic.ca>
Date: 10 Dec 93 18:11:00 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 2610
We are really looking at two things, a glossary and an index. Some
people want to know WHAT something is, and others are just willing
to ask WHERE the information is. For people like me, with 80% of the
RQ II stuff and all the RQ III stuff (except character sheets), just
learning WHERE is enough.
One of my gaming group is putting together an index in Paradox. It
is a lot of work, far more than I have time for. Saying that, once I
finish my thesis, I would be willing to do my part. The division of
work should be based upon books, CoP, CoT, or whatever. Then someone
should be responsible for integrating the information and putting in
a shared site like one of the FRP FTP sites.
Yes, ASCII should be the default format. Exporting and formatting from
ANY database system should be easy - just design the report. You can
import the completed version back again. How to access the information
is one thing, let's just get in a manageable form first.
Time to go out on a limb....
I'm willing to do some coordination work and some of the data entry.
First we need to set up the format.
Could interested parties please mail me and we'll try to get this
started? Maybe we can get a mailing list set up if this goes well.
Neil
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
---------------------
From: eosgg@raesp-farn.mod.uk (Geoff Gunner)
Subject: Time, gorp. packed lunches...
Message-ID: <9312101834.AA04796@raesp-farn.mod.uk>
Date: 10 Dec 93 18:34:36 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 2611
Geoff Gunner here - been away a week, so some catching up to do.
CW> But who can observe from outside time?
Us ?
And best models of time - IMHO the best one is the 'single timeline' model,
where you can't change the past because the future proves you didn't, so
something unpleasant is likely to happen to you if you persist. A great excuse
to have all your players die from coronaries if they mess with your scenario.
Slimestone Gorp's 80 pts of acid: Sandy says to inflict the players with awe
and terror. Awww, come on, Sandy, that's overkill ! My players are terrified
of the rumours of one vampire lurking in the area. Okay, so perhaps to impress
on the unwary that this thing is BEEEG trouble you give it those numbers, but
then we're back to the hideously high attribute debate again.
However, the description of the gorp's 'acid' being chaos dissolving the
structure of the universe is nice - that I can use. Actual substance is then
irrelevant. Shall have to change the word 'acid'; need some descriptions of
what 'dissolved' matter looks like - shifting stuff of primal chaos, with the
occasional fleck of reality roiling to the surface ?
And Andrew Raphael's comments on it (possibly) being a chaos elemental - YES!
I hereby revoke all I said about gorp previously; thanks to those better minds
out there. So PERHAPS the SSG could exist, IF my players are nice to me.
So is chaos the zero'th element ?
That brings up a point that's always bugged me - elementals. But the RQ
cosmology makes no provision for the elemental planes - apart from the
elementals, they're never referenced. I'm swimming in vast areas of ignorance
here - any enlightenment ?
Thanks to Brandon for the description of heroquesting - any more details ?
Geoff. 'But still it (the gorp) doesn't move'.