From: RuneQuest-Request@Glorantha.Holland.Sun.COM (RQ Digest Maintainer)
To: RuneQuest@Glorantha.Holland.Sun.COM (Daily automated RQ-Digest)
Reply-To: RuneQuest@Glorantha.Holland.Sun.COM (RuneQuest Daily)
Subject: RuneQuest Daily, Mon, 02 May 1994, part 2
Sender: Henk.Langeveld@Holland.Sun.COM
Content-Return: Prohibited
Precedence: junk
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From: MOBTOTRM@vaxc.cc.monash.edu.au
Subject: Lost Subber
Message-ID: <01HBUD618IQW99GUHM@vaxc.cc.monash.edu.au>
Date: 2 May 94 09:52:23 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 3864
Attention Tony Sprenger, if you're on e-mail (or if anyone who knows him
is!)
I sent you your copy of Tales #11 but it bounced back to me with a "Not at
the Address, return to sender" note on it. The address I sent it to
was 45 Willard Street Carina QLD 4152
which I believe is/was your brother Paul's address, according to my records.
I know that you actually live in London, so if you're now getting your
copies of Tales direct from Reaching Moon Megacorp HQ please tell me!
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From: alex@dcs.gla.ac.uk (Alex Ferguson)
Subject: Hello, sailor.
Message-ID: <9405011818.AA06985@keppel.dcs.gla.ac.uk>
Date: 1 May 94 18:18:38 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 3865
Joerg:
> I have a Hendriki boy, son of a family of crafters, wanting
> to become a sailor. I told him to do so, he would have to go with his
> uncle who does the trading of his family's products, and via Issaries
> initiation (at home) and Dormal initiation (on board) he'd become a
> Holy Country sailor.
Why Issaries? I think very few sailors would join his cult, as Dormal
also serves a Communication purpose.
> I still don't know what deity his parents worship. We said they were
> in the textile business
You mean his parents are weavers, or merchants? If the later, one presumes
they're members of some Malkioni(sed) merchant class, likely including an
element of Issaries worship.
> But a male Orlanthi, even if he
> is a town dweller, couldn't really be expected to worship a handmaiden
> of Ernalda (one of these would be the weaver) as primary deity.
If he's an actual weaver, I think he probably would. This would, after all,
be "women's work" to hard-line Orlanthi, but urbanised people are likely
to be more flexible regarding traditional gender roles. A more sophisticated
weaving "industry" might redefine distinct stages (carding, spinning, weaving,
etc.) of the process to be appropriate tasks for each gender, assigning them
to the province of Orlanth Maker, Voriof, or an aspect of Ernalda or Asrelia
accordingly.
Regarding the son, I would say he wouldn't necessarily join his parents'
religion if they knew and approved of his wish to become a sailor: he could
have been sponsored by, apprenticed to, or conceivably fostered by his
uncle or other likely patron to enable him to join the necessary cult(s).
Alex.
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From: alex@dcs.gla.ac.uk (Alex Ferguson)
Subject: Imponderable Pelorian posers.
Message-ID: <9405011820.AA06990@keppel.dcs.gla.ac.uk>
Date: 1 May 94 18:20:51 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 3866
What was the Dawn Age population of Peloria? (Third age = 6 million.)
What approximate proportion of the male populace of the following areas
worship: a) Yelm; b) other solar deities; c) Lodril (or close relatives).
i) Cities in Dara Happa proper.
ii) Other Pelorian cities.
iii) Rural areas of D. H.
iv) Rural areas elsewhere in Peloria.
Most brownie points for a)/i), but all putative datapoints welcome.
Alex.
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From: alex@dcs.gla.ac.uk (Alex Ferguson)
Subject: A big re-hello to Sandy.
Message-ID: <9405011909.AA07030@keppel.dcs.gla.ac.uk>
Date: 1 May 94 19:09:20 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 3867
Re-HELLO!
;-)
Sandy:
> MOB asks:
> >What do other people think about making direct comparisons between
> >terrestrial and lozengial locations?
> I think it is a useful and highly adaptive gamemastering
> technique. It assists the players in envisioning the world around
> them and the cultures they are encountering.
This is true, but it has the distinct downside of making them seem
falsely familiar, and devaluing their uniqueness.
> For that matter, I compare the Dead Place to the Utah salt flats.
This seems a plausible geoclimatic comparison, as do Sandy's others, but
if one puts more stress on this similarity than in describing it from
a native Praxian's point of view, or in the way a Gloranthan of whatever
background would look at it, then this is something of a thumb in the eye
for suspension of player disbelief.
> Not only are both devoid of life, but both
> are supposedly the remains of a dead lake (this info on the Dead
> Place I get from looking at a topographic map of Prax).
I'm not sure about that: after all, no-one mentioned Eiritha getting her
feet wet during the relevant incident. The relief and drainage of the
area may have been changed at this time.
> Of course, the Dead Place also has dire magic effects.
This is the Main Point from a Praxian's viewpoint, not an afterthought.
> >Calling Yelm `benign', because he shines one everyone, worshipper or
> >not is a bit dubious, too: one might as well say Orlanth was
> >`benign' for not suffocating everyone.
> The natural effects of a deity reflect his nature to some degree.
Or vice versa, depending on one's God Learning inclinations. But this
is only broadly true, in any case, or Huitzilopochtli would have been a
pussycat. Aztec belief instead portrayed Quetzalco'atl, who was
associated, in broad terms, with the wind, as a more `benevolent'
deity in the Petersenian sense. (Frex, not requiring human sacrifice.)
> The sun's effects rarely are harmful to folks
> and crops, whereas bad storms are well-known everywhere.
This isn't necessarily true, either: in some places seriously damaging
storms are almost unknown, while in other areas drought, sun-stroke, or
crop failure due to excess sun and insufficient rainfall might be regarded
as significant hazards. Perhaps this tends to very with the above quibble,
I'm not sure. (I'm not even going to say "ozone layer" or "malignant
melanoma".)
> I play that Storm Khans get 1D10 DI, and so does everyone I know.
So would I -- if I'd ever had one. But by that token, so would High
Healers. I just noticed Talons don't have an increased DI chance: this
is very odd, given the use of this in worship. An RQ2->3 glitch?
> Alex also continues needling me about becoming a Dayzatar monk.
Sandy, I never suggested you should become a Dayzatar monk: your
denomination's spirit of reprisal wouldn't go for it at all. ;-)
> Everyone doesn't become one because you gotta have been a priest in
> long standing of some other Solar cult.
Ah! An extra requirement. That helps, not least since it means that
qualification for Yelm the Elder and Dayzatar aren't identical.
> >If you take the published history of Sun County seriously, [the
> >Praxian Yelmalions] were, for a time, completely isolated.
> Sorry. Haven't even read Sun County. Don't even own a copy.
I believe the key part of this (the Light List) was published elsewhere
previously. Borderlands?
> >Has anyone run across references to actual people (not gods) riding
> >chariots?
> Sounds like a Solar thing to me.
Indeed, very Indian, and by association, likely to be kinda Dara Happan.
But oddly, it's the Orlanthi that worship the relevant deity. Most odd.
Perhaps this is the role the Carmanians (see G:CotHW; PB:G 3) worship
Mastakos in?
Alex.
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From: joe@sartar.toppoint.de (Joerg Baumgartner)
Subject: Invisible God <> Fake!
Message-ID:
Date: 1 May 94 21:12:07 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 3869
Graeme Lindsell in X-RQ-ID: 3847
> Richard Staats writes:
>> At RQ-CON, Greg and Sandy said that
>> a being could not worship Arachne Solara *directly*, but it *was*
>> possible for there to be false spirits/intermediate beings.
> Which would imply that the Invisible God is a fake but the central
> Genertelans know the _real_ god. There goes cultural relativism...
How so? Arachne Solara is one step closer to the woshippers than the
Invisible God. She is in and of the Universe.
--
-- Joerg Baumgartner joe@sartar.toppoint.de
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From: joe@sartar.toppoint.de (Joerg Baumgartner)
Subject: Norse Polygamy
Message-ID:
Date: 1 May 94 21:12:19 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 3870
Nick Brooke in X-RQ-ID: 3853
> More grist to the mill: Carmanians were certainly polygamous (by which I
> mean the Shahs and the richest Satraps at their more decadent periods;
> certainly less than the 3% mooted here). They also originated the customs
> followed by some Lunars of maintaining harems (and bath-houses, too!). I'm
> worried that real-world polygamy crops up only in hot countries, but this
> has always been a problem with Gloranthan climate (hairy Nordic barbarians
> in the south, with Mediterranean/Middle Eastern empires to the north), so
> I'm just going with the flow and ignoring the resulting "implausability".
> Besides, the summers were hotter before the Moon... and you've got to have
> something to do in the long, cold winters...
If it releaves your worries, King Harald Harfagre (Finehair) of Norway
had more than two dozen wives. Other chieftains who could afford to offer
each wife a full stead to keep the keys might have had, too, not to
count the concubines which were in fact sub-wives with claim only to
a cottage, not a full stead. Nothing to do with latitude...
For the climatic inversion, check out the height of Dragon Pass. The
Elf Sea lies about 1000 metres above sea level, and to the Rockwoods
there is a continuous rise from there, until the mountains themselves
rise another 1500 metres in average, so that the higher peaks will
easily be over 4000 metres above sea level. The Bush Range would be at
almost 1800 metres above the sea, then, and the wide upper Oslir valley
would still be at 1000 metres around Furthest. Ten degrees lower
temperature than lowland in the same latitude (assuming that Valind
feeds the Middle Air so that the barometrical altitude cooling is replaced
by a similar effect, whose presence is evident from Inora's realms in
the Rockwoods) will result in hairy people.
But I will add my doubts about Karasal and Erigia having temperate climate.
Paul Reilly in X-RQ-ID: 3855
Sandy:
>It is possible (but I'm not sure) that the Brithini and
>>Vadeli are a different species from Homo sapiens.
> Aren't the people of Seshnela and Loskalm descended from Brithini
> colonists? At least according to the history in Cults of Terror. Of
> course they could have 'evolved' into a different species.
Same thing happend to the Agimori, who apparently changed species when
they first drank water.
>> I classify trolls as a separate order within the mammals, the
> I think that that is convergence rather than a common ancestor. Rock
> digesting ability is kind of a tipoff... I think that Kyger Litor ate
> something of the Man shape and learned the shape, prodauce Man shaped
> children.
In my alternate evolution, rock digesting was something the turf-eating
filterer ancestors of the trolls developed, abusing vestigial organs (I
don't think exist in Real Earth, but what the heck).
>> Trolls give milk, have body hair, etc. They're obviously mammals. I
> Interesting. We play that this is a similarity of form but that there
> are underlying differences. The 'milk' is a modified and enriched form
> of blood (rather than sweat as in mammals), the hair is chitinous and
> more similar to caterpillar hair than mammal hair, etc.
What a great new industry - trollkin silk manufactures! Feed 'em dirt, and
harvest fine black silk. Whole new trade routes wait to be established!
I'd stick with the spiral proteine helix for troll hair, and leave
two-dimensional helices to real insects. The presence of bugs in cold Hell,
well, bugs me. Troll biology has nothing else in common with insectoids.
> Sweat is one of the distinguishing features of a mammal. Do you think
> Trolls sweat? Their heat tolerance seems a bit low.
Maybe their extremely mineral-rich sweat (they eat the stuff) doesn't
evaporate well, thus diminishing cooling effects.
>> Dwarfs I'm not sure of. I have yet to be convinced that
> Constructs. Living machines (the true Mostali) built them.
Misconstructs, since they are actually growing things.
Not too different from human creation myths, by the way...
--
-- Joerg Baumgartner joe@sartar.toppoint.de
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From: alex@dcs.gla.ac.uk (Alex Ferguson)
Subject: Low Initiation, sequence homologies, and other concepts awaiting a
Message-ID: <9405012211.AA08424@trinidad.dcs.gla.ac.uk>
Date: 1 May 94 22:11:28 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 3871
Joerg:
> Simply say that the initiation into adulthood gives you an all-associate
> status, and costs one POW, and that you're expected to join a specific
> cult appropriate to your function, for the same point of POW.
You have me truly confused now, Joerg. Didn't you just say (in the other
message I replied to today) that you were proposing that adulthood
initiation _wouldn't_ involve POW sacrifice?
Bryan J. Maloney:
> Well, I think I can dispell the argument regarding the use of simple
> quantitative DNA sequence homology comparison as the primary criterion
> of taxonomic classification.
Let me first "dispell" the suggestion that anyone ever said this. I was
citing the genetic similarity only in the context of pouring scorn on
the homonid/great apes classification, not suggesting anything like the
above.
> Let us accept that "a chimpanzee" has
> a "98% sequence homology" with "a human". Note the quotes.
I do, and let me note also that _I_ certainly didn't use two of them,
lest it be thought that someone, like say me, who started this thread,
was actually being quoted here.
> Ultimately, the basic "type" of
> organism something turns out to be is determined by genetic coding, but it's
> a great deal more complicated than simple quantitative analysis would make
> things appear. For example[s deleted]:
Who would doubt this?
> Now, what has this to do with chimpanzees and humans?
Not a lot, really. The function of particular sequences isn't very
important when one is considering a classification which purports to
explain how particular species _got_ them, to wit, divergent evolution.
> It
> can be probably used to clarify some finer points, but I wouldn't swear
> by it.
Only insofar as the metric itself being overly crude, not the underlying
principle.
> Another way of looking at this: A male human shares greater sequence
> homology over his entire genome with a male chimpanzee than does a male human
> share with a female human or a male chimp with a female chimp. Does this
> make male chimpanzees more closely biologically related to male humans than
> female humans are related to male humans?
I think what it means is your definition of "sequence homology" (a) isn't
a concept I appealed to as such; and (b) needs work. You're claiming
males and females are (at most) 99% "similar" since (appromimately) half of
one chromatid is missing in the male, and hence is "entirely different" from
the corresponding one in the female, right? Why the maximum would be less
than 99% escapes me for the moment, but is probably not very relevant.
> (For the astute: Yes, I am talking about the XX/XY chromosome pairs. I
> consider it an excellent way to illustrate the absurdity of quantitative
> genetic taxonomy as a primary method.)
Saying an X and a Y are only (roughly) 50% homologous, as you appear to
be implying, is a highly misleading way of looking at this. There is
no reasonable comparison for saying that the "missing" parts of a Y are
"as dissimilar" as a 100% mismatch along that part of the sequence. I think
this explains your dubious numbers.
Alex.
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