Bell Digest v940608p2

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, Wed, 08 Jun 1994, part 2
Sender: Henk.Langeveld@Holland.Sun.COM
Content-Return: Prohibited
Precedence: junk


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

From: swj@liverpool.ac.uk (Mr S.W. Jones)
Subject: Sartar stuff and Lore.
Message-ID: <199406071226.NAA28983@uxg.liv.ac.uk>
Date: 7 Jun 94 14:26:20 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 4408


Nice ideas about Sartar, a couple of comments though- the vineyards of
Sartar? KoS mentions Colymars wife, priestess of Ernalda recieving some 
special _unique_ winter grapes; another point is that the Greydog Inn,
has only (I think) Clearwine and Old Madges Gooseberry wine, apart from 
imports- remembering that wine can be made from almost anything
(except maybe rocks).
 So a rainy Sartar seems OK, especially in the North - after all Skyfall
 Lake probably helps precipitation, and further south, is Sun Dome County,
 I'm only guessing but wouldn't that normally mean plenty of sunshine,
 or maybe they're just not very devout.
_________________________________________________________________________ 
Songweaver's Tale.

	"That was just after Boldhome fell, or was the year of No Rain 
Clouds, anyway, as I was saying, Salk had just thanked Orlanth for the 
Movement Rune.
	The merchants had been very generous, I think they were trying
 to impress some new governor, anyway Salk didn't know what to do with
 the silvers, and some Lunar was breathing on him to attend his summer
 court, Salk didn't care three dilnip berries for the Lunars court and
 told him red is a good colour for him to be wearing as it matched his
 face; 'course this was all the ladies benefit, and they were loving it,
 always did have a way with them.
	'Course it wouldn't have been so bad if he'd not got caught 
leaving the Lunars wifes quarters, thank Orlanth.
	So we ends up in Herongreen, good town that, good folk, some 
funny names they got for stuff there though, Vale of Bones, I didn't 
see none though, anyways its coming up Windsday an' it's Harmony 
week so its time to do some worshipping, 'course it's a good place to 
Herongreen, they got plenty of good spirits there, whole bunch of spirits
in the trees, south end of the Green- spirits say that Orlanth himself 
came to grow some trees for Ernalda, just so as to show he could do it,
 'course Orlanths no grower, so she helps, but it isn't right. But
Donander comes along, as he likes to and he breathes some of his own
harmonious voice into the trees, so that when the wind gets up the trees
sing- folk there call Windwhistle trees, and no man or child can get
a bad nights sleep under them.
	Good place that, lucky, the trees and the Herons, 'course thats 
another story.
	So Dusk comes, and Salk starts the rituals, and many townsfolk have
gathered cause theres not often such a famous priest comes by to worship
in this end of Sartar, and naturally theres many Weavers about on the holy
 night, and they enter into whoevers willing.
	 Feeling holy, Salk does two dances, Donander the Jewel Sky Ring 
and Orlanth and the Tree Mother, bit of a crowd pleaser. 
	Yelm descends and the Night hordes follow, until Salk begins,
then it seems like Yelm has come back, 'course its not real, and Salk 
dances Donanders Challenge to Yelms Captains, and every knows how that one
goes even here and then his tribute to the good folk, some of the folk 
cried, there a bit emotional around here, it's a good job he kept off the
Lightbringers Tales; so anyways, the Lunars here aren't too happy now 
neither, they always feel left out, but Salk isn't gonna learn any 
Lunar dances, 'specially after what they did to his folk... I mean
okay they was rebels but.. what..oh, how did we end up on the Pavis road,
now thats another story..."     

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

From: swj@liverpool.ac.uk (Mr S.W. Jones)
Subject: Sartar extra
Message-ID: <199406071238.NAA29620@uxg.liv.ac.uk>
Date: 7 Jun 94 14:38:30 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 4409

My record of the e-mail I've just sent is missing the next few paragraphs,
 if it did turn up OK then please ignore this,

Notes.
	Songweaver is an _old_ allied spirit of Donander, in my campaign
the spirits of Donander priests "Songweavers" are allowed to travel the 
ways re-telling old songs and myths and posessing those who would let them
to re-enact the dances and magic of those tales.
	Salk is one of my NPCs and I believe is still knocking about in 
Sartar, Songweaver may be encountered on the Pavis road.
	If anyone can help me get a write up of the Gagarth cult, which I 
believe is in the Daily archives, I have no index, so  don't be shy.
	On a final note I have a unofficial write-up of the Donander
cult (it needed one) if anyones interested - or I can pop it on the Digest.

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

From: SYS_RSH%PV0A@hobbes.cca.rockwell.com (The Lotus Jukebox)
Subject: Cat Juggling...er, Breeding
Message-ID: <01HD95E8Q3OY8Y6AGO@hobbes.cca.rockwell.com>
Date: 7 Jun 94 03:14:10 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 4410

>Surely domestic dogs act as they do due to the fact they have been 
>bred by humans. Wouldn't this stand for cats? 

Probably not.  It's much more difficult to breed traits into cats 
than it is for dogs.  Dog chromosomes are a lot more...hmm, pliable 
than cat (or just about any other animal) chromosomes.  Also, dogs 
aren't as far removed from wolves as we like to think (although 
breeding has changed them greatly).  They still exhibit strong pack 
behavior, for example.  Most cats exhibit solitary behavior (lions 
are a classic exception).  In fact, cougars are so anti-social that 
they'll go out of their way to avoid other cougars outside of mating 
season.  This wouldn't make for good cooperation in a 
group/herd/pride/whatever.  It *is* possible to train a cat, if you 
have a lot of patience and an agreeable kitty (I've done it), so I 
wouoldn't rule out all training of cats.

All of the above is based on the assumption that Gloranthan cats 
would be much like Earthly cats (since G. dogs seem to be 
transplanted E. dogs).  Personally, I think it would be *great* for 
people to have trained hunting cats.  Glorantha ain't Earth, have fun 
with it!

--Scott


PS  Love the Heler theory. ;)

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

From: SYS_RSH%PV0A@hobbes.cca.rockwell.com (The Lotus Jukebox)
Subject: Manipulating thought with Language
Message-ID: <01HD95Q2K8W28WXATP@hobbes.cca.rockwell.com>
Date: 7 Jun 94 03:23:42 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 4411

I believe Jack Vance wrote a book called "The Languages of Pao" that 
covers this very concept.  It's an interesting story.  Essentially, 
some invaders attempted to alter the social structure of an entire 
planet by introducing specific languages to specific groups...and 
weren't entirely successful.  Check it out.


>The Russian language once
>had the same word for "Red" and "Beautiful" (hence Red Square)

HA!  My friend Nickolai (native Russian) gave me a copy of one page 
of his Russian-English dictionary after he learned that I'm getting 
married.  Apparently, the Russian "BRAK" (English transliteration) 
means both 'marriage' and 'defective waste product.'  (:


--Scott

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

From: jonas.schiott@vinga.hum.gu.se (Jonas Schiott)
Subject: Re: Sandy's "gibberish".
Message-ID: <9406071329.AA12738@vinga.hum.gu.se>
Date: 7 Jun 94 22:43:36 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 4412

>You'll find the near-desert in  
>Corolaland and Ormsland, I believe.

Hmm, Corolaland is described as being rather more pleasant in the First
Age, but then I suppose being a Troll Hunting Ground for a millenium or so
might have depleted the area...

>Vustria isn't so bad. That is,  
>it's drier than Sartar, but it's not desert by any stretch of the  
>imagination.

Yeah, the population figure given for hsunchen (Genertela Book) doesn't
have any specific location given, so we're assuming that a lot of them
(Galanini, mostly) spend much of their time in Vustria.

>I don't even think that the Wonderwood centaurs and the  
>Seshnegi centaurs come from a common source. I suspect Seshnegi are a  
>GL remnant, while Wonderwood are Something Else. 

Absolutely. I don't really remember what justification we had for putting
beastmen in Saug and Wonderwood, but they seem to be there to stay. Our
current origin theory is that some hsunchen fleeing the persecutions of
various empires during the Second Age sought refuge in Wonderwood. The
Guardians (more about them later) were unsure about letting them stay: on
the one hand they _were_ beasts and beast-kin, but on the other hand some
of them looked too much like humans for comfort. A compromise was arrived
at - the resulting fusion was completely voluntary, and thus did not result
in the kind of angst or pain described for Dragon Pass beastmen.

>Maybe Mastakos, with fine Mobility spells, is the god of  
>choice for young boy sheepherders in the Eastern Wilds? 

I like it.

>the Kivitti and certain other beastly hybrids are  
>probably the result of degenerate Hsunchen.

Could be. This hybridization would have to be dated (?) to the Godtime, a
period which we have been careful to say very little about. But we _have_
dropped a few hints here and there, such as implying there was a
dragonewt-hsunchen war. Obviously the hsunchen won. How? I mean, dragon
magic can be pretty darn powerful... Maybe the Kivitti were the hsunchen's
secret weapon? Or rather, weapon of desperation? Maybe it wasn't
intentional; they could just have been elephant hsunchen who cast so much
magic on themselves that they got stuck in that form? Doesn't really matter
much which version is true, no one will ever know about it anyway...


(      Jonas Schiott                                   )
(      Institutionen for Ide- och lardomshistoria      )
(      Goteborgs Universitet                           )


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

From: jonas.schiott@vinga.hum.gu.se (Jonas Schiott)
Subject: Storm Beasts...
Message-ID: <9406071354.AA12918@vinga.hum.gu.se>
Date: 7 Jun 94 23:07:40 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 4413

Harald:

>I would expect that either some storm-worshipping tribes exist, though, 
>or that certain hsunchen (elk, moose, mountain goat perhaps) worship 
>storm spirits such as King Umath as well as their founding spirit.

Quite possible. Note that what you read in the history was the state of
affairs more than a thousand years ago. Things might be very different
today. I say "might" because we haven't worked up any 'cult descriptions'
for the present-day hsunchen yet. It's entirely reasonable that such a long
time of co-habitation with orlanthi would affect them in some way.


(      Jonas Schiott                                   )
(      Institutionen for Ide- och lardomshistoria      )
(      Goteborgs Universitet                           )


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

From: MOBTOTRM@vaxc.cc.monash.edu.au
Subject: Catastrophic Drive Failure...
Message-ID: <01HDA3MOOQIQ93A7FW@vaxc.cc.monash.edu.au>
Date: 8 Jun 94 10:37:23 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 4414

G'day Everyone!

_____________________________________________
The Great Collapsing Hard Disk Disaster of 94

On the 4th of June a realativistic proton from deep within radio galaxy
M87 went crashing through my hard disk, wreaking havoc and eventually
totally buggering it up (it is now something like a book that has had all
the pages superglued together - the info is all there, I just can't read
any of it!)  My computer is now in intensive care at the repair shop,
and I am slowly and subtley trying to convince my wife that a new
computer would be a profoundly good idea...

...anyway, I am now using one at school to catch up on my e-mail while
my buggered computer is debuggered.  Unfortunately, I have had all my
e-mail addresses expunged.  So, Dave, Nick, Mike et al. if you would like
me to contact you, please send me a message so I can copy your address
(and keep it off the computer this time!

________________________________
Soldiers of the Red Moon are Go! 

Some good news: I will shortly be signing a contract to complete Soldiers of
the Red Moon, a campaign pack for RuneQuest.  This may take the form of two
books, one featuring player information about the Army, including war gods
of the Empire; the other, an epic campaign taking the PCs from enlistment
all the way to bloody tribal uprising in Sartar!

Mike Dawson has been approached to edit/develop the project.

Joseph Scott, the new Rune-Governor at AH plans on end of the year release
date (RQ Con 2?).

__________
Dr Johnson

Sam Phillips:
>The Scottish diet in notoriously bad - mainly because until the major
>supermaket chains moved in in the past ten years you couldn't buy any 
>fruit or veg other than turnip and potatoes, cabbage in season and 
>the occasional apple - no joke!

I think Dr Johnson in his famous Dictionary writes of oats, "A grain,
which in England is given to horses, but in Scotland supports the
people".

Cheers

MOB

P.S. Sandy, sorry, by noting Australia's high urban density I thou
ght I was 
actually *agreeing* with you rather than disputing...ah well, ne'r mind.

P.P.S I loved John Hughes's joke about not needing to change the bulb
'cos Greg will later.  I hope a bulb or two blows at Convulsion, as all
the people attending can trot out the various jokes!

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

From: sandyp@idcube.idsoftware.com (Sandy Petersen)
Subject: random senseless jibes
Message-ID: <9406071612.AA13872@idcube.idsoftware.com>
Date: 7 Jun 94 04:12:11 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 4415

Sam sez:
>Well, Scotland is an incredibly rainy place. Though not "lush". It  
>just doesn't get enough Sun to grow large amounts of fruit'n'veg  
>etc. I suspect Sartar may have this problem, what with all those  
>Cloud Callers. Quite how they *do* grow grapes is a mystery...And as  
>for all those orchards - no way!..
	Hmm. Never heard of a horticulture drawback being  
insufficient sun rather than insufficient rain. But I guess Scotland  
IS incredibly far north -- after all, all of the continental U.S. is  
far south of it. Which is why, I suppose, the perennial problem in  
OUR bad lands is lack of rain instead. 

	You can't grow orchards in Scotland? Utah, with a semi-desert  
climate, is able to support apricots, apples, peaches, pears,  
cherries, etc. with ease. Perhaps because of this, I always thought  
that orchards were an easier thing to grow than an annual crop such  
as corn. 

	If Clearwine isn't made from grapes, then what? 


>>the ground's so steep a cow'd roll off
>-Arf! Thats why haggises have one pair of legs longer than the  
>other..
	Aha. The evolutionary antecedents of the Sidehill Gouger are  
now becoming clear. 


>Are warriors who live next to volcanos braver than warriors who  
>don't?
	they might at least be more fatalistic. 


>Surely domestic dogs act as they do due to the fact they have been  
>bred by humans. Wouldn't this stand for cats? Wolves don't hunt  
>radically differently than, say, lionesses. Do they? If a wolf can  
>be bred to round up sheep then why not cats?
	Domestic dogs act as they do because of their own natural  
jackal/wolf instincts, as modified by breeding. A dog "naturally"  
likes to course after prey. A modification of this enables the  
breeder to get a sheepdog. Dogs naturally run down their food and are  
obedient & loyal to their owner, whom they consider to be either  
their dad or their pack leader, depending on the type of dog (see  
Konrad Lorenz's KING SOLOMON'S RING). Cats, on the other hand, stalk  
their prey cautiously, are highly solitary, and appear to consider  
their masters equals at best. The cats' nocturnal habits would also  
appear to make it a poor choice for a sheepherding animal. 

	Lions are the only social cats, and they have a number of  
appalling personal habits that make them a poor choice for  
domestication. I have seen nothing about shadow cats that would  
indicate that they are any more social than a cougar or lynx. 

	And yes, wolves hunt significantly differently than  
lionesses. Lionesses normally set an ambush, while wolves chase the  
damn things down, tiring them to death. The actual kill is extremely  
different, too. The wolves, much smaller and weaker animals, rip at  
the soft bits of their prey, hoping to shock it with pain, after  
which they can kill it. The lion, once it's knocked down an antelope,  
strangles it to death. 


Devin Cutler, in an attempt to demonstrate that Gloranthan humans are  
more devout than Earthly ones, sez:
>just because magic exists in a non-Divine form doesn't suddenly
>convince Gloranthans that their deities are impotent.
	No, but it may well make them cynical about their gods. The  
fact that there are Bad Gods who give magic, and Good Gods who give  
magic, and sorcerers who learn magic on their own, etc. means that  
the whole world is engulfed in magic, much as our own world is  
engulfed in beauty. Yet BECAUSE of this universality of magic, I  
submit that Gloranthans may often be less than devout. What's the big  
deal? Everyone gets magic. Don't get me wrong, I think that  
Gloranthans are in general more devout than 20th century humans, but  
I don't think they're necessarily more devout than 9th century  
humans. 


Sandy




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

From: niwe@ppvku.ericsson.se (Nils Weinander)
Subject: Minor points & a little Red Tiger snippet
Message-ID: <9406071621.AA18333@ppvku.ericsson.se>
Date: 7 Jun 94 20:21:03 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 4416

Nils Weinander writing

Sandy in the daily of June 07:
>	Now see here. In the First Place, I was contrasting the U.S.  
>to Europe, which is clearly way overpopulated and due for another war  
>or Black Death.

Ever been to Sweden? If you travel along a road in northern Scandinavia
you loose any notions about over-populated Europe.

Nick in the daily of June 06:
>I'm not sure if the god of this distillation process is Tanian...

In our gaming group we have come to the conclusion that distillation
is a cult secret of the Lodril cult. Fiery tasting fluids seem all
right for a fire cult, and the resulting intoxication seem ideologically
correct for a cult connected to the disorder rune. On the other hand
we run a non-standard Lodril cult. The meek peasant and craftsman bit
seems OK for the fertility/earth-warming aspect of Lodril, but the
violent, disorderly volcano god should be served by another kind of
people, so we rule that there are two "paths" in the cult. Most
worshippers follow the "lowfire" path, but some instead choose the
"wildfire" path, which is a warrior's cult, whose members in consequence
with the disorder rune show disturbing tendencies toward senseless
violence. I currently play a wildfire rune lord who has acquired
a strong affinity with disorder in a recent heroquest...

My piece on the honoured mandarin Ih Talwor, Red Tiger wasn't met
with boos and hisses, so I'll go on with some more from his silken
scrolls. The following is a little epilogue to his heroquest to meet
the August Dragon.

'...
After my audience with the exalted Imin Long, the August Dragon I
meditated for many hours on the paradox of the Void. Like all imperfect
humans I have great difficulties to grasp the concept of the Void as
the root of all existence. The ensuing paradox that all is nothing seems
as an unsolvable formula, and perhaps it is. I got the first spark of
_my_ {the emphasis is important} reconciliation with the paradox when
a traveling merchant accused of using forged weights told me the old
parable of the onion: "Life is like an onion, you peel off layer after
layer, and in the end you find that in the center there is nothing".
What I recognized was that existence has no purpose in or of itself,
the only meaning comes from what you put in it yourself. Thus the Void
is the basis of existence. {So, is Red Tiger a proto-existentialist?}
But the paradox bends back on itself: this is _my_ revelation and I
cannot transfer it to those who hear my voice or read my writing;
everyone must find his own revelation and fill existence with _her_
purpose.
...'

The next Red Tiger installment will probably be an account of his
journey to the East Isles to find a magic child preordained to be
an Exarch of Kralorela. He will also in a future story be sent on
a dangerous mission of vengeance to Bliss in Ignorance.
(Just to give you some appetite...)

/Nils W