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, Tue, 19 Jul 1994, part 4 Sender: Henk.Langeveld@Holland.Sun.COM Content-Return: Prohibited Precedence: junk --------------------- From: SMITHH@A1.MGH.HARVARD.EDU (Harald Smith 617 726-2172) Subject: a new jannisor tale Message-ID: <01HEUX9HGI6EQZGD5I@MR.MGH.HARVARD.EDU> Date: 18 Jul 94 11:35:00 GMT X-RQ-ID: 5213 The Death of Jannisor by Harald Smith (This tale is most common in the Southlands and Westlands of Imther. It is derived from two sources: The History of the Lunar Empire-1st Wane which appeared in Wyrms Footnotes 11 and an early Wyrms Footnotes article on the Twin Stars counter for Nomad Gods.) Jannisor stood upon the Great Bridge, the Silver Road, rising high in argent radiance toward the mountain called the Crater and upon its edge, the City of Dreams. All looking at him knew him for a hero. His eyes, his stride, his voice all gave away his status. As if these were not enought, the unblinking eye of Brighteye his magic shield, the peculiarradiance of his Spear of Hope, and the dark aura of his netlike cloak all spoke of the hero who bore them. In all his army, there was only one who knew him as friend and companion, not as hero, and that was Onstheus, champion of the Mastine marl. Behind the beard, fashioned as always in the style of Khelmal, and the crested helm given by the lords of Raibanth, Jannisor looked ahead toward the home of his final earthbound foe. He did not think now of his old friend and companion. He barely thought of the army behind him. Only his bride, the Sable Queen, broke upon his concentration. "Will he attack again?" asked the queen, referring to that eternal foe, the Red Emperor. "Of that there is no doubt," replied Jannisor. "All that matters is the form he takes and when." Jannisor made several motions to advance his forces up the bridge. Inhuman elvish archers moved first to clear the bridge of its remaining foes. Along the flanks moved the brutish nomads sitting on their shaggy horses. Behind Jannisor and his queen came first Karash'arll, the daemon of the Fourth Hell. The others who followed--the pikemen of Dara Happa, the Sable Riders, the southern allies led by Onstheus--all kept their space from the daemon. For the moment few foes bothered Jannisor's army. Most of the Lunar army fell early when the lords of Shargash shattered the Outer Gates and crumbled buildings atop their foes. Those lords still kept the Lunar remnants at bay in the streets below. Jannisor considered the likely actions of the Red Emperor, a cripple since their encounter two years prior. "So close to the heart of the Red Goddess," Jannisor thought, "is chaos not most likely? Yet I am prepared for that and he knows that, too." Jannisor thought upon the madmen bound to Tork, about the four-horned servitors which he dispatched as readily as the Emperor himself, about the power of the Emperor's own spirit. Jannisor thought about the Crimson Bat, the greatest chaos beast known to men. But surely that was needed in the provinces. "If he brings the bat here," said Jannisor to himself, "then surely he will lose the provinces to the Carmanians or others." "What do you think, my husband," asked the Sable Queen, masked in her great horned helm. "I think he pursues a devious and deadly plan. See now," and he pointed, "they come again." "Then he is impatient and rash." "No, not impatient," answered the hero. "He seeks to distract us. Guard your gift well for I am sure he seeks it." The Sable Queen patted the pouch at her side, smiled, and winked at her husband. Within that pouch was the marriage gift from Jannisor himself, given at her request--the privy part of the Emperor taken by Jannisor when last the two had met. "Fear not. Only I have access to it. You can even see the wards upon it." Jannisor turned his attention toward the advancing foe. More of the Imperial bodyguard approached, grim-faced soldiers with deeply scarred faces. Jannisor moved the Dara Happans forward. Cold-blooded strokes rained down upon the pikemen. The arrows of the elvish archers were matched by strange red comets streaking down from the heights of the Inner City. Men and elves cried out, but Jannisor marched on. With Karash'arll's aid, Jannisor cleared a path for others to follow. "It is like moving through a forest," he said to his bride. "Save only that these trees would as soon kill you as shelter you." Where Brighteye glared, grim-faced men fell and begged for mercy or red comets vanished as if mere illusions. Where Jannisor's Spear of Hope struck, the defenders were daunted and fell back. Where the daemon, Karash'arll, walked magic vanished and death spread. Before these weapons and the pikes of Dara Happa, the Lunars broke and fled. It was not long before the next wave came. Now red-faced brothers and sons of the Emperor walked forward, sickles and scimitars glowing with the power of their magic. The elvish arrows bounced off their magic shields, falling harmlessly to the earth far below. Jannisor ordered the nomads forward in a furious assault followed by the solid phalanxes of pikemen. Honed to perfection, though, the moon sons proved deadly foes. Each move by a moon son brought down many of Jannisor's allies. So Jannisor advanced. Brighteye's glare broke the lesser sons. The Sable Folk, led now by their queen, proved immune to the madness the moon sons sought to invoke and they brought down many of their foes. In the center of the fray, Jannisor met the five greatest of moon sons. He danced with them, circling first one way and then another. They met and parted and met again. They dropped when he rose and he rose when they dropped. Jannisor spun upon his heels and with each spin he struck with his spear. First one moon son and then another fell until all five lay dead. Jannisor repeated his dance with another group and another. Under the hero's deadly thrusts, the defenders fell back and Jannisor's army surged ahead. Wiping sweat from his beard, Jannisor smiled at his bride. "It is like a game of Empire, each ploy and counterploy carefully designed to conceal the real strategy. But each move brings the game closer and closer to completion. I can feel the ending upon us." Now invisible assassins sought the side of Jannisor, but Brighteye revealed them and Jannisor brought them down. Moon spiders dropped from the sky to seize the Sable Queen, but her blade was not mere ornamentation. She cut their life threads and led them down to hell itself. A demon with three heads, each shouting curses, came against them, but Karash'arll met it and took the curses. He wrestled it and crushed it and ate it to prove the curses worthless. Jannisor now placed the Sable Folk on his right and the Dara Happans on his left. Onstheus held the center behind the hero as they reached the Dreaming Gate. The Sable Queen nodded approvingly and Jannisor said, "Now we shall see where the Emperor hides himself. The end is but one move away." The Dreaming Gate stood open and mists shrouded the city within. Upon each side of the gate, raised up on twin pedastals, stood two women. Twins they were with flowing hair of crimson and scarlet. "Halt," cried the one upon the right who carried book and spear aloft. "Hold," cried the other who kept her hands concealed within her silver cloak. Jannisor approached. "Begone maidens of the moon, lest I slay you, too." The first twin, the one to his right, replied, "Hear me, people of the Lunar Deer! I am Erelia and I tell you that you are here to meet your mother. I am Erelia and I tell you that through you alone the Red Goddess came to shine upon your darkened land." Before Erelia, the Sable Folk watched as her book opened and the annals of the Mothers poured forth. Words never heard before, words of the past, came out to the Sable Riders of a destiny they did not know. They sat confused, for they had not known these words, but the words spoke true for Brighteye did not dispel them. The second twin, the one to his left, replied, "Hear me, Jannisor! I am Verelia and I tell you that you are here to meet your doom. I am Verelia and I tell you that your queen, your bride, has handled the member of your foe and has lain with it in darkened hall." Before Verelia, Jannisor turned upon his bride and watched as confusion and guilt spread across the Sable Queen's face. Surprise and suspicion grew within the heart of Jannisor, feelings that he did not know. He sat confused for the words spoke true, but when he turned again to his bride, Verelia cast her cloak upon his shield, the magical Brighteye. Naked but for a dagger, she caught the hero from the side and plunged her dagger into his back. As Jannisor fell, chaos erupted on the field of battle. Nomads and elves in the rear charged upon the Sable Folk calling them traitors to the hero. The Full Moon Corps charged out from the gate to meet the Dara Happans while Crater Makers hurled great stones upon the pikemen. A tentacled demon reached up from beneath the bridge and pulled Karash'arll down. Around the body of Jannisor was a fight for the hero's soul. Erelia with her magic book stole the mind of Jannisor and locked it shut within. Verelia pulled Brighteye from his arm and carried it into the City of Dreams. But Onstheus, champion of the Mastine marl, stood over Jannisor, shielding him from soul-wasting blows, while the Imtherian allies, whether Mastine or Cratar, Laramite or Wilktar, fought the dreams that drive men mad. When the Red Emperor marched out and claimed the Sable Queen as his bride, Onstheus slew the traitoress. When the Red Emperor freed his own spirit to roam again, Onstheus turned it with the Spear of Hope. And when the Red Emperor sought to take a third grisly portion from the hero, Onstheus stopped all the dark and deadly blows with his mighty Shield of Light. Then Onstheus wrapped the hero's body within the fisher's net cloak and carried the body from the bridge. The Cratar marl gave up its soul to allow Onstheus to carry Jannisor to safety. The Mastine, Laramite, and Wilktar marls led the moon sons on a merry chase away from Onstheus' path from which few returned. And at an unknown hill in far Kostaddi, Onstheus, who had shared his cheese with Jannisor, burnt the body, cloak, and soul of his friend and companion so the hero could escape to live again. Upon the Great Bridge, the Silver Road, rising high in argent radiance toward the mountain called the Crater stood the Red Emperor. All looking at him now knew him for a hero. The Emperor was whole again and his gaze swept wide across the southern lands as he planned for his next victory. --------------------- From: ANDOVER@delphi.com Subject: Firshala Message-ID: <01HEUYXN70BM9I75YO@delphi.com> Date: 18 Jul 94 13:45:01 GMT X-RQ-ID: 5214 Our party of 4 young native Balazarings from the same tribe already included a Yelmalio worshipper who was friendly to elves. The character who rescued Firshala became her first Priest. Unfortunately for him, when he used Firshala's divine intervention to save himself from the lagoon monster off Festering Isle, he also became Firshala's first Priestess! His wife and son had some trouble with this. She traded some allosaur eggs to the King Of Dykene for permission to build a temple there, and then traded Cyriel Endelkar's gargoyle dog (after an amusing expedition to capture it and get it to Rokheart) and a bunch of money to the dwarves for them to build the temple (something totally beyond the Balazaring characters). Since the party is now divided on the elf question, the (now) priestess of Firshala and the Yelmalio elf-friend are trying to figure out a Heroquest which would reconcile Firshala and the elves! Any suggestions? Oh, and after swapping the spike on the crab island to Blueface (I ruled that Blueface couldn't get it himself else he would have long since) for some help which enabled them to recover from a huge battle (with elef help) against the ZZ party, the Priestess used the profits to pay Joh Mith to get some of the sex- change cream from black elves! When he comes back next year, it will be interesting to see if it works! And whether Firshala will consider a sex0change away from her form to be sacreligious! --------------------- From: alex@dcs.gla.ac.uk (Alex Ferguson) Subject: Chuggian approximations. Message-ID: <9407182146.AA27410@hawaii.dcs.gla.ac.uk> Date: 18 Jul 94 21:46:18 GMT X-RQ-ID: 5215 Barron Chugg: > Subject: Gooooooooooaaaallll!!! So lads, what about the football then? ;-) > Alex (quoting me): > >As an encouraging model, look at Pendragon; it's explicitly sexist, in > >both game mechanics and background, more out of regard for "literary" > >realism than the historical sort. But if anything, it's (relatively) > >oversubscribed with female players, according to anecdotal evidence. > I think that Pendragon is appealing (to both sexes) because it has a > strong literary basis and is focused on roleplaying and character > interaction. In my experience, female players, in particular, are more > interested in character interaction than in mechanics and combat. Yes, I agree. (I wasn't suggesting they played _because_ of the sexist background, for heaven's sakes! ;-) "Oooh, oppress me again, Mr. Evil Chauvanist Pig GM, sir." ;-) ;-) But I do think this is enhanced by respecting the sources, and not just munging it wholesale for the sake of player-friendliness.) While Glorantha hardly has quite the same "strong literary basis", it comes from that "tradition", as it were, and wasn't created as a Gaming Vehicle, but as a consistent(ish) world in its own right, where things are more usually decided on by literary or internal criteria than on those of shoft-term gamely convenience. > >> I have seen (well, read descriptions of) games where all the characters > >> must be male (regardless of the gender of the player). This might work in > >> a _very_ limited arena, but I don't think it is a good policy at all. I'm > >> not flaming you, just pointing out a difference in perspective. > >Please note that I'm not, as you seem to have inferred, trying to denigrate > >"traditional" female roles. > Huh? This came outta left field at me (insert appropriate cricket idiom > here at your liesure :-)). Err, perhaps "throw from long leg"? > I am not accusing you of denigrating > traditional female roles, either explicitly or implicitly. Well, good, though I'm then somewhat mystified as to what "difference in perspective" you were pointing out, assuming I was the person you weren't flaming. (Eh?) > I'll go even further here: > I think that the idea "that women have "important" roles in all > Gloranthan societies" has never really been realized. Never been ever attempted to be realised, as far as I can see. But should it? Is this (alleged) goal beneficial to anyone's gaming interests? Would this make the various cultures which currently Offend against it more interesting, either as PCs or as background colour? Would Trowjang, Esrolia, or Troll society be "improved" by allowing _males_ (more) important roles? Is it an affront to the red-blooded males of the gaming comunity that political and economical power in the Pamaltalan interior rests with the women? And of course, it still begs the question, "What do you mean by "important"? > WARNING: TECHNO-NERDY DIGRESSION AHEAD!!! Quite. ;-) > >> I'd think of the MM as the zeroth order approximation to the mythology of > >> Glorantha. > >To inject a note of domain-theoretical nerdishness (or is that geekery? I'm > >never quite sure), I'd say a 1st approx., the 0th one being a blank sheet > >of paper. > I must defend my 0th order term. This is, by definition, the > approximation of a function by a constant. A constant with respect to? Not the culture or region, since it has different "clauses" for the (major) pantheons. To make a meta-nerdish observation, though, we're using different "`technical'" definitions of "zero-order", so your kilometerage may vary... > END TECHNO-NERDERY > In conclusion, Codex...Good, Hooliganism...Bad. In summary, summery. Alex. --------------------- From: guy.hoyle@chrysalis.org Subject: NO DAILIES? Message-ID: <9407181810.0PJAL03@chrysalis.org> Date: 18 Jul 94 16:10:38 GMT X-RQ-ID: 5216 I haven't seen any copies of the Daily since Friday's. --------------------- From: sstair@cs.utep.edu Subject: Nysalor's Riddles Message-ID: <9407190327.AA02405@cs.utep.edu> Date: 19 Jul 94 03:27:13 GMT X-RQ-ID: 5217 Does anyone have any of Nysalor's riddles? Also, if each riddle corresponds to a specific skill, must the riddle actually have any relation to the skill? If so, what skill corresponds to Nysalor's riddle #19 in Dorastor? Stephen Stair --------------------- From: Argrath@aol.com Subject: Very little on Buddhism Message-ID: <9407182340.tn594856@aol.com> Date: 19 Jul 94 03:40:10 GMT X-RQ-ID: 5218 Barron Chugg: Thanks for the kind words on my contributions to Codex #2. I decided to make a virtue of necessity and focus on the social. That IS the way I see Malkionism, with Islam-like fights over succession and legal philosophy, rather than like a game of Credo. Of course, if it turns out that Greg Stafford's idea of Malkioni history is raging controversy over doctrinal minutiae, I have my emergency fall-back position, which is a valid way of looking at that piece even now: the history represents Galagern's propaganda. Galagern is the "My Lord High Priest" which the history is dedicated to. Things to ask Mike Dawson when he gets back from Convulsion: 1. Is the Ginna Jar seat on the PQ Ring empty, as stated under the Storm Voice Volger Rawin write-up on page 21, or is it held by Melora, as stated in the last paragraph of page 20 and under the Mistress Deenina of Zoria write-up on page 22? 2. Is the Janu Gate mentioned in the first new paragraph on page 24 the same as the River Gate on the map? Other than that, and the spelling of "tongue," I didn't spot any problems. (But where's the credit to the Talking Heads for the quote under "The Unspeakable Name"?) RQ CON II NOTE: I am going to be running a game set in Galastar at the Con (date and time uncertain; stay tuned). Seven lucky people will get to play in The Galastar Peace Council, trying to find a solution to those pesky riots and crop-burnings. It turns out the Uleria temple didn't bring an end to the strife. Owning a copy of Codex #2 is strongly recommended for this game. Things that PCs will not know from C2: * the existence of the Hidden Folk (my idea, BTW) * the female infanticide of the 7 families, except for PCs from the families (noblewomen aren't seen much by outsiders--how would the hoi polloi know if there were more men than women?) Oh, and someone critted his Buddhism Lore roll and reminded me that, while Arkat brought Malkionism to Heortland, Bodhidharma did no such thing. Yes, but I had a koan I wanted to use, and needed the tie-in. Aren't you glad I brought this up? Actually, there may have been missionaries before Arkat, but Arkat's influenced swamped any signs of earlier contact, IMHO. --Martin --------------------- From: ddunham@radiomail.net (David Dunham) Subject: Ralian Writing Message-ID: <199407190500.AA20883@radiomail.net> Date: 19 Jul 94 05:00:45 GMT X-RQ-ID: 5219 Nick Brooke said >One of my loose ideas is that a written form of Safelstran is gaining >ground in some Ralian city-states: knowledge can be written down in the >tongue of the people! A very dangerous novelty... No doubt what happened in Wexten... I imagine that the East Wilds Lhankor Mhy types are illiterate. Those in Vesmonstran have adopted Safelstran [i.e. Western] characters to write either Otkori or Lankan (much as the Celts used the Roman alphabet in various inscriptions). I hadn't until now thought that the Safelstrans might not approve of their script being borrowed... --------------------- From: davidc@cs.uwa.edu.au (David Cake) Subject: Re: Western: Kanji or Latin? Message-ID: <199407190559.NAA20421@melomys.cs.uwa.oz.au> Date: 19 Jul 94 06:01:18 GMT X-RQ-ID: 5220 > _____ > Dave: > > > I tend towards the idea that the Runes actual shapes are descended from > > Western, which is probably an ideographic writing form like Kanji > > (several different spoken languages share one written form, the only > > earth equivalent as far as I know being Kanji). > > What about Latin? Which was the written form of French, Provencal, Italian > and Spanish (inter alia) until they developed their own scripts. I find it The difference is that someone who learns to read Loskalmi, can also read (say) Jonatelan. In mediaeval times is was not the case that learning to read French allowed you to read Italian (though it probably helped due to language similarity), because if you wanted to read you probably first learned Latin. > more convenient to assume the language of Brithos is "equivalent to" pure > Classical Latin in everyday use; the other Western spoken tongues are then > like "degenerate" Romance languages, closely related to one another and to > the root language. And, like pre-Dante Italy, the language of the common > folk isn't written down (or would look to anyone like a grotesquely corrupt > form of proper writing); the Wise write in pure Brithini, the book-language > of the learned. > But we know that the Western languages share the same written form, which is not true of the written forms of the Romance languages (they are related, but not the same). My simple solution to this problem (that the written form is far more closely related than the spoken form) is that the Western language is an ideogrphic script like Kanji, which represents concepts rather than sounds. Two people who both speak and write a Western tongue (but not the same one) cannot communicate very well at all by speaking, but can read each others writing easily - this cannot be explained by a psuedo Latin language. As it happens, I tend to use Latin as a psuedo Brithini script, but that does not mean that I want to extend that metaphor to include the script. I rather like the mixing and matching of elements to make it seem less like Europe. Besides, a language of ideograms seems to me to fit in with the reveration of logic and abstraction that I see as part of the Brithini character. > (One of my loose ideas is that a written form of Safelstran is gaining > ground in some Ralian city-states: knowledge can be written down in the > tongue of the people! A very dangerous novelty...) > Interesting - but the Kanji idea does not preclude that sort of thing. Compare the relationship between Kanji and native Japanese scripts in Japan - Kanji was the language of the intelligentsia, but much less widely known. > Jrusteli taxonomic classifications are in Latin, and come from the West... > As I said, I like the idea that it sounds like Latin, to impart the proper flavour, but I ideographic script suits the facts better. So I consider the psuedo-LAtin merely a convention for flavour, not a clue to the truth. Cheers Dave > ==== > Nick > ==== > ---------------------