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, Mon, 10 Jan 1994, 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: stormbull@cix.compulink.co.uk (Tim Westlake)
Subject: Re: RuneQuest Daily
Message-ID:
Date: 8 Jan 94 13:15:28 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 2758
In-Reply-To:
In the 6th of January digest Nick Brooke asks
> Has anyone else on the Daily ever had to fill out a U.S. visa form?
Yes, and I deny being a nazi war criminal as well! (what are those
imigration people on?)
------------
David Dunham mentioned the Mongols
We in the UK had a great TV documentry series last year about the
Mongols (Storm from the East) which had some great info on these guys.
One of the tricks they used was to wear silk shirts under their leather
armor. If they were hit by an arrow, this would penetrate the leather
and stick into them. It would not break the silk however and the shirt
would be wraped around the head of the arrow. Most damage from an arrow
is caused when you remove it (the barbs etc) but with the silk wrapped
around the arrow head made the removal much more easily and cleanly (!)
When they attacked Eastern Europe they managed to wipe out the cream of
European chivalry in a couple of battles. The reason they were so
effective was that they cheated (they used tactics! - damn underhand if
you ask me :-). The only reason that all of western europe wasnt over
run was that the Khan died so they all turned round and went home!
-----------------
Nils Hammer in the 8th of january digest
> The unmounted warriors work in teams of 2. One has a two-handed sword,
> and the other a two-handed shield. The shieldman takes the on-coming
> lance by parry or getting run through. The swordsman steps out from
> behind the shield and cleaves the horse as it goes by.
I have heard this too. ISTR it was a viking trick but cant vouch for it.
------------------------
Troll eating habbits
Trolls will eat almost anything (see the original Troll Pack). From the
Kygor Litor section of Cults of Prax :
" They are religiously obligated to eat Aldryami, and are said to prefer
the flesh of dwarves over any other. Children of humans are prefered for
holiday feasts, but they complain about the ashy taste of dragonnewt
flesh whilse they eat it."
and Re Karrgs sons
"They must ritually eat a large quantity of some vegitable matter.
(Elves are considered vegetable matter.) On each seasonal Holy Day a
Rune Lord must eat a relative. (This can be a trollkin.)"
Eating sentients is a part of basic troll culture as instructed by Kygor
Litor herself. It would reasonable to assume that trolls who dont eat
sentients are probably considered very strange if not social outcasts.
Human morals about not eating things that talk would appear to be the
odd one out of the Gloranthan races, I mean the dragon arnt fussy either
and would you want to argue with one of them?
----------------
Thanks for the info supplied about the Seven Mothers. I think that I
will have to either wait for a Lunar suppliment (I'm not holding my
breath) or write up my own. Ho hum.
Tim
---------------------
From: sandyp@idcube.idsoftware.com (Sandy Petersen)
Subject: re: RQ Daily
Message-ID: <9401082100.AA16473@idcube.idsoftware.com>
Date: 8 Jan 94 09:00:21 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 2759
Andrew Raphael opines:
>I think that Waha's Covenant forces morokanth living under it to
>make a careful distinction between herd men (who lost the toss) and
>humans (who won the toss). Assuming that sable riders don't eat
>bison riders, then no morokanth initiate of Waha or Eiritha would
>eat a human without risking apostasy.
Clearly I disagree, based on my recent opinionating on this subject.
One: The morokanth are creatures of Darkness, with emotions, lusts,
and needs alien to humanity. Two: it's not "cannibalism" to eat a
human if you're a morokanth -- a social faux pas at worst. Three: why
is it "apostasy" to eat a human for Waha or Eiritha morokanth? It's
not apostasy to eat a number of animals not included in the Waha
covenant (jackrabbits, cattle, birds, locusts, etc.) Humans possess
the cultural norm (and I think rightly so) that it is bad to eat any
sentient being. I concur with this cultural norm, but it doesn't mean
the morokanth concur.
I think the picky social distinction between man and herd-man is MUCH
more important to the humans than it ever is to the morocanth. After
all, Waha said that the morokanth are supposed to eat people, right?
I believe that a sizable fraction of morokanth feel that the proper
order of things, according to Waha's covenant, is morocanth eat
people who eat herd-beasts who eat grass. The herd-man spell is
simply to make the humans more tranquil and easy to handle.
Even among the humans of Prax, I believe that the herd-man situation
results in a good deal of ambivalence among the beast-riders. It's
clearly distasteful (though technically okay) to eat a herd-man (just
as even the Lunars won't eat the human parts of a walktapus), so what
do you do with one? I bet there's lots of ribald jokes in Prax about
milking herd-women. In the end, I expect most captive herd-men are
sold back to the morokanth, or sacrificed in rites of darkness. But I
don't think many herd-men are captured. The morokanth are not as easy
to raid as the human tribes, and their "cattle" are not so valuable.
I generally play the morokanth rites of Waha and Eiritha as being
significantly-different from the human ones. Many humans don't even
want to think about the implications of morokanth that are highly
skilled in the Peaceful Cut (i.e., killing humans with a single blow
-- the origin of the morokanth Martial Arts?)
On the other hand, I've been called a morokanth-basher. I've also
been called anti-elf, anti-dwarf, etc. I think that the secret is
that I try hard to make sure that the non-humans in my campaign don't
behave like humans, or even in acceptable-to-human manners. I find
highly colorful nonhumans far more interesting than the usual D&Dish
"humans in a furry suit".
STORY TIME: While running a pickup RQ game, I suddenly discovered
that one of the participants was playing a dwarf. I made a comment
that it was a good thing the party was in a bar, because no doubt
she'd be drinking plenty of booze. She said no, she was a teetotaler.
I thought that was unusual. Because my NPCs generally react to the
(unusual) presence of nonhumans, the barmaid made a crack about the
dwarf being short and stubby. The player said that HER dwarf was tall
and willowy. I was amazed, and said, "What an unusual dwarf you have.
I'm very impressed." Then the player lectured me about racial
prejudice and stereotyping.
I said, "They're RQ dwarfs, mostali! Who the heck cares if I
racially stereotype them?" She was adamant that stereotyping of
non-human imaginary races was JUST AS BAD as such stereotypes about
blacks, jews, or other ethnic groups. Almost speechless, I gibbered,
"But the entire purpose of nonhumans in fantasy games is to provide
stereotypes to play off of! Even when people run 'different'
nonhumans from the rest, like tough elves, it's to provide contrast
with the bulk of their species." She didn't see it, and wouldn't even
buy my theory that "clearly your dwarf is different from most
dwarfs," saying that I couldn't fairly have preconceptions about ANY
dwarfs. In the end, wishing to get on with the game. I just said,
"well, most of the humans in this area are racially prejudiced, I
guess, and they have a lot of preconceptions about dwarfs." That
satisfied her. This was in the days before Political Correctness, by
the way, but I guess she was ahead of her time.
>There's a Waha Rune spell that turns humans into herd men. That's
>part of the magical ecology of Prax. I think it should work on
>Wereran humans only.
I feel that the Kralorelan, Agimori, and Veldang humans are not a
different species from the Wereran, so the spell should work on them.
Though their ancestors (might) not have participated in the covenant
of Waha, they certainly engaged in some other similar rite of
prehistory in which mankind was differentiated from not-men.
I never heard of kuru being called the "ghost disease" before. I
always heard of it as the "laughing sickness". And it was not the
cause of the elimination of cannibalism among the Fore tribe (they
ate their own deceased family members as a sign of respect). Rather
governmental intervention caused the cessation of this funeral rite.
Lewis(?) says:
>Great Trolls were a half successful attempt by Crag Spider to
>recreate the Mistress Race.
I think they were actually made to break the trollkin curse, one of
two such semi-successful attempts. The second such attempt resulted
in the birth of multiple trollkin per pregnancy (before that,
trollkin came singly, just like trolls). This second attempt was
pretty important to the trolls -- imagine the pitiful status of the
troll race if trollkin were not even plentiful!
Watson asks:
>What is the result if the various different types of elementals are
>set against each other in combat?
I think they should have a definite effect upon one another. In
addition, elementals of "dominant" types should have an advantage
over their inferiors.
Here is my suggestion (I've tried this and it works, but of course
some other technique might be even better). I have the elementals
fight one another in a sort of spirit combat. A victory costs the
defending elemental 2d6 MPs, and 2 cubic meters of SIZ. When a
"dominant" type attacks its inferior, the dominant gives the other
3d6 MP/3 cubic meter loss on a win, while the inferior does only 1d6
MP/1 cubic meter on a win. Combat must continue till one elemental is
destroyed. Anyone entering the elemental combat zone suffers
automatic attacks from both elementals. Normally I don't bother to
figure out the new stats of the victorious elemental (assuming its
lost cubic meters of SIZ) until the battle is entirely finished.
Darkness > Earth > Air > Water > Fire > Darkness
Lunes are not dominant to anything.
Dave Dunham:
Once more tries to defend the Aztecs.
>The only protein source is humans. (Note that some people think this
>is almost the same situation facing the Aztecs, who packed a whole
>lot of people into the Valley of Mexico).
See here Dave, the Aztec crime was human sacrifice, not cannibalism.
Sure the priests ate portions of the sacrificed bodies, but this
didn't solve any protein shortage for their teeming population. In
any case, they had beans and corn for effective protein substitutes,
plus plenty of fish in the lake they lived on.
>Why can't YA have both Kill Horse (really annoys the leader of the
>nomads) and Frighten Horse (to work against the whole horde)?
She can, she can! But Kill Horse is a new spell, not previously
included in her cult. How about if Kill Horse cannot be resisted, but
is a 2-point one-use spell? Does that seem fair? Remember that most
Kill Horse attempts will be against very special (maybe even
sentient) horses.
Anti-Cavalry tactics:
The techniques used by the peasant Jacquerie rebellion in
14th-century France is probably inappropriate to Lunar training, but
certainly bears repeating. Both techniques required waiting until the
knight had completed his charge and was engaged in melee, slashing
with sword or axe while the horse kicked and bit.
One technique was to use long hooks (either billhooks, or metal
pitchforks with one prong bent back) to pull a knight off his horse.
The other was to have a (ballsy) guy actually roll UNDER the horse
with a knife and slash at its tendons. Both techniques had the
immediate goal in mind of dismounting the rider. Once down, guys
armed with mauls would pop open the knight's armor to get at the
meat.
The Jacquerie methods, and Nils Hammer's method of combining a tower
shield and greatsword both are pretty much only good vs. heavy or
medium cavalry. The basic Lunar problem would seem to be the fact
that properly-trained infantry can generally defeat any cavalry force
except for horse archers. You need light cavalry of your own to beat
the horse archers, and they'll get whupped by the Pent medium and
light cavalry, who are (let's face it) likely to be superior to the
Lunar cavalry, few of whom were born on horseback.
---------------------
From: ngl28@rz.uni-kiel.d400.de (ngl28)
Subject: "SACRIFICE AND YARA ARANIS ARCHERY MAGIC
Message-ID: <5381*_S=ngl28_OU=rz_PRMD=uni-kiel_ADMD=d400_C=de_@MHS>
Date: 7 Jan 94 16:37:05 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 2760
Colin Watson in X-RQ-ID: 2743
>David Dunham wrote:
>>Orlanthi culture is sort of a cross between Cymric/Celtic and Viking.
>I never really saw what was so Celtic about Orlanthi. A Storm God certainly
>doesn't seem very Celtic to me. They're more like Vikings without ships.
E.g. the way they combine warrior god worship with earth mother worship.
The Vikings had MALE fertility deities, most prominently Freyr, but also
Thor. Freya had little to do with agricultural fertility...
Another thing is the ritual sacrifice of kings after a certain period of
time, like in Tarsh, the elective King motive, the Great Marriage motive
(very prominent in KoS, CHDP has at least five narrations about it:
Ironhoof's courting of the Wild Lady, Arim the Pauper's courting of Sorana
Tor, Sartar's wooing of the Feathered Horse Queen, Tarkalor's and Phargentes
courting of the Feathered Horse Queen, and of course Argrath's multiple
marriages to an earth priestess (of Grazelands, of Holay, of Saird), the
clothing and general appearance of the Orlanthi (c.f. Walter Moore's
excellent cover illustration of TotRM 9), their urban societies in oppida (
ask Nick Brooke about Whitewall), a circle of oaks on a hilltop as temple
ground, ... (running out of first ideas)
_______________
>Human Sacrifice:
>My tuppence to add to the ongoing discussion:
>Remember, in the real world it wasn't only outsiders and enemies who were
>sacrificed; victims were sometimes extracted from the ranks of followers
>(and even leaders). Sometimes it was an honour to be sacrificed; folks even
>volunteered.
E.g. the Norsemen. Read the Ynglingatal by Snorre Sturlason, the ynglinga
leader who settled Jaemtland was sacrificed when the third bad year in a
row occured (after beast sacrifices the first year, slave sacrifice the
second year). BTW, the bad years were due to overpopulation, and when the
gods didn't change this even after one of their descendants had been
sacrificed, some of them moved on and solved the problem the mundane way.
>This is true of the Celts, tho I dunno about the Aztecs (didn't
>one of their methods involve playing some kinda ballgame to elect victims?).
The flower wars are, at least in fiction, depicted as a convenient way to
provide a) sacrifices and b) protein nutrition to the masses. The ball
gamers were the Maya, if I remember correctly.
>In Glorantha I think chaos cultists are as likely to go around sacrificing
>each other rather than outsiders who's souls are pledged to other gods already.
One of the points of death by chaos is the severing of ties to the worlds
by dissolution in the void. Only Storm Bull can assure to recover the
deceased from chaos annihilation, and then only into his realm of afterlife.
Thus I'd expect chaotics to use non-chaotic sacrifices just out of spite.
They're evil, after all :-)
_____________________________
>Sandy wrote about Yara Aranis:
>>...some kind of anti-archery spell, the exact nature of which escapes me.
>>...no doubt the RQ Daily can come up with a
>>better spell than we had then. I hereby throw it out to you guys.
>>What's the anti-archery spell of YA?
>Well, I don't know if YA has any runic justification for this, but the
>best way to screw archers would be with a spell which increased the
>strength of the wind locally (like Cloudcall increases cloud cover). If
>they could whip up a gale (with several/many castings I guess) then any
>missile fire would become pointless. Granted, the downside is that the YAs
>couldn't use their crossbows, but so what? real men fight toe-to-toe.
>(I suppose the perfect spell would have a lull every coupla rounds so you
>can fire yer crossbow - but that's a touch game-mechanicky...)
>(And note, of course, that Sureshot whould ignore the effects of wind-strength.)
No it isn't, unless you create whirlwinds or alternating wind forces. I've
shot fairly reliably into a five metre radius circle over 165 metres with
(real world) wind strength 11 against the wind. I think a horde of
advancing troops can be abstracted as such a circle. Of course, you don't
aim at single targets any more, but the chances that there is someone when
the arrow comes down are good enough to be worth the ammo.
>'course, a wind-affecting spell would have other uses too: at sea for example;
>or against airborne attackers.
The only Lunar Storm power I know of is Molanni. not quite what one would
need...
If you want to annoy archers, weaken their bows, so that range, damage and
reliability are reduced. I know of one inccident in the Cid's Spain where
the moorish horse archery was rendered useless because heavy rain dissolved
the glue of their composite bows.
Too bad Heler's a chum of Orlanth, too...
So affect the bow directly. Soften the material, and the archer is out of
the game.
What I cannot figure out is how to coordinate the spell attacks so that
there are no duplicate bow diminishments. This calls rather for area
effects. (the same goes for frightening the horses, by the way).
Maybe sudden, dense fog would do the trick - with visibility and bow force
reduced, the horse archers do get problems. Stationary missile troops can
continue to fire, unless there is a shortage of ammo. Just knowing the
ballistics and the general direction is enough against massed enemies.
Justy my 0.02 DM
Joerg Baumgartner
ngl28@rz.uni-kiel.d400.de
---------------------
From: mcarthur@fit.qut.edu.au (Mr Robert McArthur)
Subject: Protection forts/stockades give?
Message-ID: <199401100003.KAA17683@fitmail.fit.qut.edu.au>
Date: 10 Jan 94 15:03:36 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 2761
In an old rq2 game, the Lunars had come to Prax and are trying to settle
things down a bit. They have come to Barbarian Town, the start of *many*
good adventures for rq fans I bet, and started building a stockade of
sorts. Now, for various reasons some characters wanted to see/be inside the
gates. One idea was to go inside in spirit form (discorporation, shamans
etc) The GM said that when the stockade was created, spirits were bound
inside the walls to protect the place, check people going through the
gates, as well as those attempting to climb the walls stealthly at night
et al. Now, it seems to me that, if you have such spirits, you hardly need
many troops walking around protecting the place. They could all be inside
imbibing the local juniper juice waiting for the spirit to rush in and warn
them exactly who and where the intruders are. Anticlimax or so...
Comments from anyone? Are spirits normally bound like this? How many of
them? Size of them? Can they detect enemies (and of whom)? Can they engage
in spirit combat with a spirit coming through the wall? Over the wall? Under
the walls?
Annoyed beaten-up character spirits want to know!
Robert
---------------------
From: mcarthur@fit.qut.edu.au (Mr Robert McArthur)
Subject: sacrifice
Message-ID: <199401100007.KAA17754@fitmail.fit.qut.edu.au>
Date: 10 Jan 94 15:07:09 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 2762
...and on the matter of (human) sacrifices, doesn't a Zorak Zoran Death Lord
have to eat a troll of kin each season? or am I just an outdated RQ2er...
Robert
---------------------
From: pmichaels@aol.com
Subject: various stuff
Message-ID: <9401092314.tn76614@aol.com>
Date: 10 Jan 94 04:14:43 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 2763
Hi all! Sorry it's taken me so long to get back on some of this stuff, but
you know how life is.
re: passion spirits
I also thought about calling the lazyness spirit a sloth spirit, but then I
imagined seeing something like: Sloth Spirit - A spirit which manifests as
the fuzzy face of an animal floating in the air. If a person is posessed by
this spirit, they have an uncontrollable urge to hang motion
lessly from their hands and feet in the branches of a tree, slowly chewing
leaves.
Ahhh, I'm probably making too much of this. Given the historic use of the
name for the vice, sloth spirit it is.
Thom: you noted that most folks do not use the fatigue rules as written.
Good point. I like both yo
ur and Sandy's ideas about the person posessed avoiding hard labor.
Sandy: I agree that the greed spirit is something that should be inflicted
only on characters whose players enjoy the role-playing aspect of the game.
Personally, I think that this should probably be the case for anything which
changes the personality of a PC beyond what the player has developed. I
also liked your suggestion about a s
pirit that affects a person's magical abilities, which has got me to thinking
some more. Perhaps I
'll post my thoughts when they are clarified a bit more.
Joerg: I'm very interested in the tex
t from your Free INT #2 article on emotion spirits, even if it is in German.
If it's OK with Markus Weiand, can you email it to me? Perhaps I can find
someone to translate it for me.
on to other topics....
Sam: I enjoyed your one complete Sartar nursery rhyme. My two year old son
Benjamin has taken
to it too, and at least every other day for the last few weeks asks me to say
"Knock, knock
" with him. :-) If you find your other ones, I'd like to see them.
On the White Moon Movement: I think that at least one contingent of this
movement should be made up of illuminated ogres who worship Cacodemon and are
fanatically dedicated pacifistic anarchists. Thoughts?
I don't know what the anti-archery Yara Aranis rune magic spell is, but I do
have an interesting spirit magic spell to share, which might fit in
somewhere:
Bowslow - Variable, Ranged, Temporal, Passive
Despite the name, this spell affects any missile fired by a weapon. Once cast
on the firing weapon (bow, crossbow, sling, etc...), all missiles fired from
that weapon do 3 less points of damage and subtract 15 percentiles from the
attack chance. This effect is can be countered by the spirit magic spell
Speedart for a specific missile. This spell will effect magical missiles
created by the spirit magic spell Multimissile.
Lastly, in looking at the actual usage of a word (which has changed since
first introduced), I'd like to offer the follow
ing only-half-serious definition for :
gregged, gregged v.t. To be corrected regarding information about Glorantha
due to published information being revised or unavailable, or due to the lack
of published information; to learn that the underlying assumptions you have
made about Glorantha and have developed into key elements in your campaign
were discussed and rejected over 10 years ago in a conversation privy only to
three players in the original Gloranthan house campaign but they never told
anyone else about it until YOU brought it up. ;-)
Does anyone else have other definitions?
Peace, Peter