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, Fri, 04 Nov 1994, part 1
Sender: Henk.Langeveld@Holland.Sun.COM
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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.
X-RQ-ID: index
6836: RobMH = RobMH@aol.com
- Re: Pam Carlson's Esrolia Thoughts
6837: JARDINE = JARDINE@RMCS.CRANFIELD.AC.UK
- Lewis speculates on what Sandy has been playing
6838: erisie = (Sven *Erik Sievrin)
- Re: RuneQuest Daily, Thu, 03 Nov 1994, part 2
6839: watson = (Colin Watson)
- Gods, IMHO
6840: loren = (Loren Miller)
- RQ Rules, incorrect instructions
6841: mab = (boris)
- A possible model for the Godplane and Heroquests
6842: RF03 = RF03@academia.swt.edu
- Giants
6843: CHEN190 = (Peter Metcalfe, CAPE Canty)
- Divers Things
6844: DevinC = DevinC@aol.com
- Re: HQing
6845: alex = (Alex Ferguson)
- Walking corpses
6846: alex = (Alex Ferguson)
- Fetches; Rune Economics
6847: alex = (Alex Ferguson)
- Moon matters
6848: carlsonp = (Carlson, Pam)
- Esrolia, Yelm
6849: Private_User = (Carlson, Pam)
- haploid/diploid
6850: alex = (Alex Ferguson)
- Aldryami: floor wax or dessert topping?
6851: ddunham = (David Dunham)
- Shamans; Ralian Ernalda
6852: RobMH = RobMH@aol.com
- The Lunar Future
---------------------
From: RobMH@aol.com
Subject: Re: Pam Carlson's Esrolia Thoughts
Message-ID: <9411030439228212003@aol.com>
Date: 3 Nov 94 01:11:45 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6836
Well-reasoned, I like the alternative view of the non-necessity of marriage.
A clannish Esrolian society in which most strongly recognized kin
relationships are between females and males are drifting bits. Might even
suit the Esrolian men just fine; I can see an Esrolian man looking aghast at
the way men of other cultures get married to one person for life. This would
be the jesting counterpoint to the idea that women are on top in the society:
the Esrolian men say, "Yes, our women are on top, that's where we like
them."
--Rob Heinsoo
---------------------
From: JARDINE@RMCS.CRANFIELD.AC.UK
Subject: Lewis speculates on what Sandy has been playing
Message-ID: <9411031200.AA19864@Sun.COM>
Date: 3 Nov 94 11:50:00 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6837
Hi Sandy
My thought about your warped sense of killer monsters is that
you have been playing (& designing) too much DOOM rather than CoC...
Cheers
Lewis
---------------------
From: erisie@utu.fi (Sven *Erik Sievrin)
Subject: Re: RuneQuest Daily, Thu, 03 Nov 1994, part 2
Message-ID:
Date: 3 Nov 94 18:43:04 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6838
Uh, first of all, sorry for those overlong quotes, Nick and Jonas and
anyone else annoyed. Wont do it again, I promise.
Second, could someone help me with this: I know that metal is supposed to
be the bones of the gods, and to be found where there were battles in the
Godtime etc. However, the only times I can see any mines mentioned is in
the Mostali context, and they don't serve the rest of the world with
metals, that is for sure. So, where are the mines (or other sources of
metal) in eg Dragon Pass and Kethaela? If they only import, from where?
Thanks,
Erik
---------------------
From: watson@csd.abdn.ac.uk (Colin Watson)
Subject: Gods, IMHO
Message-ID: <199411031545.PAA01485@pelican.csd.abdn.ac.uk>
Date: 3 Nov 94 15:45:21 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6839
_______
Michael asks Hard questions:
> [...] why
> can not a Yelmalio Priest use divination to find out if the Elmal worshippers
> are worshipping the same god? Remember that the important part of divination
> is that the god *only knows what its worshippers know*. So such a divination
> should work, either by a "yes", because they worship me (Yelmalio) or a "no",
> because I (Yelmalio) know nothing about them so they can not worship me.
I think the essential point here is that the mapping of names to gods
is purely subjective (IMHO). One man's Yelmalio is never exactly the same as
another man's Yelmalio.
Imagine the godplane consists of a complex interwoven network of myths.
Consider a god to be defined by a subset of the mythic paths which make up
the godplane; everyone has a has a slightly different conception of who their
god is and what it did; everyone attributes slightly different myths to "their
god".
Now, if the subset of myths which you attribute to your god is sufficiently
close to those of another person (close enough for jazz), then you're both
considered to "worship the same god". Since these decisions are usually
made along cultural lines, each culture has a fairly static view of its
gods (barring schisms and such). Lots of people worshipping the same god
gives that god power which in turn gives the cult power.
In the case of Elmal and Yelmalio there is some overlap in the godplane; and
in fact, for some worshippers, their Elmal might be close enough to someone
else's Yelmalio to be considered "the same".
Anyway, the point is, the answer to your divination will be subjective;
when you fire-off your query to Yelmalio you get back the answer which fits
your (subjective) god, not necessarily anyone else's. The consensus of "what
Yelmalio knows" will be based on the views of those worshippers who
worship a god close ( enough for jazz) to your own.
> If two Dara Happan
> Rune Priests of Yelm, one who believes Yelmalio is not the son of Yelm and
> one who does, both cast Divination asking Yelm "Is Yelmalio your son?" will
> they get the same answer (yes?) or will they be answered according to their
> own beliefs?
Each will be answered according to their own god. "Belief" isn't a simple
business; and it's not something you can change like changing your socks. If
you suddenly choose to believe something about your god which nobody else
believes then your new god will have very little power - the strength of a god
comes from the magnitude of its worship.
In real terms you must have great power of your own before you can strike
out and forge new myths (or change old ones) because your old god can't
support you.
> If the latter, just what are the gods exactly? Nonexistent?
The gods exist through their cult(s). It's the cults which identify the gods.
A god doesn't exist in the same way that a person exists: an objective
model of gods which are "like people only more powerful" seems absurd to me
(although I bet many Gloranthans view them in this way). They're more
amorphous and communally defined IMO.
___
CW.
---------------------
From: loren@hops.wharton.upenn.edu (Loren Miller)
Subject: RQ Rules, incorrect instructions
Message-ID: <9411031625.AA24292@Sun.COM>
Date: 3 Nov 94 06:25:41 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6840
I made an error in the instructions for subscribing to the RQ-Rules
mailing lists. You would have figured it out pretty quickly with the
instructions that get sent back automatically, but here the correct
instructions are so that you don't have to go through a runaround.
Rather than sending email to the request address, send mail to
majordomo@hops.wharton.upenn.edu
And in the first line of the message write:
subscribe rq-rules-digest
or
subscribe rq-rules
depending on which version of the mailing list you wish to join.
--
Loren Miller
I can tell by your shoes that you are a lover of liberty
---------------------
From: mab@batman.b11.ingr.com (boris)
Subject: A possible model for the Godplane and Heroquests
Message-ID: <199411031650.AA03817@batman.b11.ingr.com>
Date: 3 Nov 94 16:50:49 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6841
In X-RQ-ID: 6834, Michael Hitchens wrote:
> Here is one result of my mis-use of the term "myth". The Godplane is
> continually acting itself out (if you see what I mean). Most myths
> correspond (at least roughly) to the state of the godplane). Those that
> don't either mean trouble for their worshippers or a heroquest to change
> the godplane is in the offing.
But they correspond to the state of the godplane *where*. Only Greg (and
possibly Sandy) knows what the "TRUE REALITY" (if any) of the godplane is.
Possibly even Greg doesn't know. It may be a meaningless question, even.
However, I have come up with a model that gives results that I like. Keep
in mind, this is *just* a model, and like any models, it will break if
pushed too far.
I think of Glorantha as resembling, in a metaphysical way, an onion. The
mundane plane is the skin. Everything inside the skin is the godplane.
Whenever someone heroquests, they push themselves a little bit into the
onion. The more "powerful" a quest you perform, the further into the onion
you push yourself. And as you go further in, you come between the "center"
and a larger part of the surface. Thus more powerful heroquests will have
more far reaching effects than less powerful ones.
Different places on the skin of our onion correspond to different cultures
in Glorantha. Cultures which are similar, such as some of the more closely
allied tribes of Sartar, will be near each other on the skin. Cultures
which are less similar will be further apart on the onion (even if they are
geographically adjacent in Glorantha, such as the Telmori and the Culbrea).
Thus the myths told about Orlanth, frex, by the Lismelder, will differ from
the Colymar myths, even though they reflect the same core (if any), because
they pass through different sections of the onion. A Colymari would have
to heroquest mightily to get far enough into the onion to overshadow both
his tribe and the Lismelder tribe. And the further in you go, the more
powerful the opposition is (the more potent the juice, so to speak).
Note that there may not be *any* center. To mix metaphors, it might be
turtles all the way down. But the deeper you go, relative to the skin,
the larger a portion of the surface you impact.
Also note that this model is just about the Godplane. Trying to extend it
to apply to the spirit plane or the heroplane (or whatever the place is
called that you go to when you heroquest in Time), will probably break it.
----
Boris
--
Boris Mikey, aka |"Here the ways of men part: if you wish to
Maurice Beyke | strive for peace of soul and pleasure, then
mabeyke@batman.b11.ingr.com| believe; if you wish to be a devotee of
Intergraph doesn't want | truth, then inquire."
my opinions. Nietzsche
Maurice A. Beyke |Usenet: mabeyke@ingr.com |
CR1100 |Office: (205) 730-6153 | Post No Sigs!
Intergraph Corp |Lab: -6384 |
Huntsville, Al 35894-0001|This sig. is politically correct and CIS friendly.
---------------------
From: RF03@academia.swt.edu
Subject: Giants
Message-ID: <01HJ1LDJP1MQQRWUDA@academia.swt.edu>
Date: 3 Nov 94 08:22:29 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6842
Given the recent discussion about Giant Cradles and how there are
numerous races of giants, I have a couple of questions. First, has
anyone ever come up names to distinguish the races? Just saying "good"
giants and "bad" (or "disorder") giants is getting tiresome, and I think
that if we had different names for them it might help explain them to newcomers. Also, are these two major races related in any way? It seems like this has
been discussed on the Daily before, but I can't remember if and when it was.
I've usually made up my own "facts" about giants off the top of my head when
asked by players, but I'm wondering if there was any official notes floating
around that I might have missed, or if anybody else has any neat ideas about
the giants that I might want to borrow or steal.
BTW, I know about the Jolanti and the Maidstone Archers, I'm mostly
just curious about the aforementioned "good" and "bad" giants. Giant myths,
giant cults anyone?
JIM
---------------------
From: DevinC@aol.com
Subject: Re: HQing
Message-ID: <941103153216250164@aol.com>
Date: 3 Nov 94 10:32:16 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6844
Devin here:
David Gadbois (the real one) writes:
"There is also the not inconsiderable twist that changing the Godplane
can change the mundane one, too. For example, one could heroquest to
prevent Grandfather Mortal from getting the first taste of Death; if you
were successful, no one would die anymore."
Hmmm, I was always under the impression that THAT hero wouldn't die and that
his worhsippers and/or followers might be able to remain immortal, but that
the rest of reality (whatever the hell that is these days) would go on dying
as normal. In other words, the act of prevent GM from dying didn't really do
back in time and stop GM. It merely stopped him as it relates to that hero
and his particular community. To other communities who do not worship the
hero or participate vicariously in the HQ, GM still died.
Regards,
Devin Cutler
devinc@aol.com
"Does anybody else in here feel the way I do?"
---------------------
From: alex@dcs.gla.ac.uk (Alex Ferguson)
Subject: Walking corpses
Message-ID: <9411032316.AA06869@hawaii.dcs.gla.ac.uk>
Date: 3 Nov 94 23:16:59 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6845
Colin Watson writes somewhat earlier in the "Characteristics for spirits"
thread:
> But think of it like this: DEX & STR are what allow a creature to
> move around and interact with the physical world; CON gives the ability
> to respire - breathing, eating etc. Upon death these faculties depart
> from the body immediately. (Good thing too, otherwise corpses of the recently
> dead could wander about mindlessly (with no INT or POW) as do animate
> Skeletons.)
Skeletons indeed lack INT and POW, but what they have instead is a
controlling enchantment, so that's no evidence that a body with DEX, etc,
should be up'n'about, anymore than a skeleton with a broken enchantment
is.
> But corpses don't breathe or move around; they don't have STR or DEX or CON.
I think they do, in some notional sense, they just can't use 'em. If a
spirit has all the characteristics it needs, why can't it possess any
creature, however incomplete, and use that as a body? Or possess a rock,
say. And if a spirit possesses the "wrong" body, does it really supply
all its own values, regardless of those of the previous occuppant?
On the other hand, it'd certainly make sense to assign "physical"
characteristics to spirits in some cases: perhaps ghoul spirits have a
"special" STR of 1D6 which they add to that of their possessee. Similarly
for all these Giant spirit possessions that're all the rage suddenly.
Alex.
---------------------
From: alex@dcs.gla.ac.uk (Alex Ferguson)
Subject: Fetches; Rune Economics
Message-ID: <9411032313.AA06860@hawaii.dcs.gla.ac.uk>
Date: 3 Nov 94 23:13:36 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6846
Simon Hibbs issues the following unsolicited testimonial:
> As a shaman, I would keep a copy of the 'visibility' spell handy
> at all times. Very usefull to cast either on yourself while
> discorporate, or on your fetch.
I don't think the second one works; surely this presupposes the fetch acts
as a (discorporate) spirit in its own right.
> I have been thinking about deities in their
> role as parent figures, super-adults.
I think you want Freud for this one, Simes, not these namby-pambies Campbell
and Jung. ;-)
David Dunham:
> Nick Brooke said
> >If I were using an annual Economics table (like the Pendragon and PDP
> >ones), the amount of Priests' RunePower spent for the benefit of the
> >community would be a modifier to annual prosperity.
> And you said you didn't want bookkeeping?
I can think of a very simple abstraction of this, in RunePower (Too )
terms: the acolyte gives up a fixed portion of her magic, representing
that you don't know when you'll just happen to need to use "personal"
Rune Magic. Then figure the bonus/penalty based on the lenten portion,
aggregated over the year. i.e., if she gives up 40% of her RunePower XL
spell, she only gets to use (at most) RunePower XXIV herself, while
the community gets 16 x (yearly regain kludge factor) points of spells
over the year.
> OK, I shouldn't have taken a potshot at RunePower.
No really, have another:
> I think I still favor the
> tradeoffs inherent in the current system. As it is now, our Ernalda acolyte
> has to decide whether she wants to help the community more, or maximize her
> adventuring power. (I think she's about 50/50, BTW.)
This balancing act clearly arises in any case, it's simply a question of
when, and how restrictively, it comes into play. Compile-time vs run-time
configuration, as it were. (Assuming the distinction is simply down to
which spells one takes, that is, which seems only partially true.) Your
Ernalda acolyte has to decide which way to go when she takes a spell use,
and is stuck with that choice, and indeed that particular spell year on
year, whatever happens.
Alex.
---------------------
From: alex@dcs.gla.ac.uk (Alex Ferguson)
Subject: Moon matters
Message-ID: <9411032303.AA06840@hawaii.dcs.gla.ac.uk>
Date: 3 Nov 94 23:03:44 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6847
Harald Smith (some time ago):
> If you look at the map in Codex #2 showing the location of the Middle Air,
> which the Red Goddess is supposed to be contesting, then I think it makes
> a very difficult argument to say it can't be seen from elsewhere outside
> the Glowline.
Ah, but this is a _mythic_ map, not a topographical one. (For example, the
implied proportions of the spike make little sense, if anyone were to live
on its "slopes" (read: precipices), never mind making it agree with the maps
in Uz Lore.
However, I do agree the moon is certainly visible outside the glowline, and
think it's past time, in fact, that we had at least a vague working guess
at its real or apparent height.
And on the subject of mine: these _don't_ include any possible "horizon
effect". (Yeah, MOB, Glorantha doesn't have a horizon, we know. )
If the horizon works _exactly_ like the terran one [1], then on my
previously suggested numbers, the moon elevations need to be modified:
in particular, they'd be _below_ the horizon throughout Pamaltela and
the central and southern oceans. From these assumptions (moon 1000km
up, 15km radius, and an effective-horizon curvature of 6371km), some
Gofer hacking, and some difficulty in remembering that it was the cosine
rule I should be using for the oblique angle of a triangle, I got that
visibility of the moon would extend to 3300 km or so; in order to be
visible 8000km away, in Jolar, it'd need to be over 14000km up. Hrm.
Modified tabulations of elevation and visual size based on these or
other sets of figures available on request.
[1] And does it? I dunno. It would if Glorantha is a sphere, or
upward-curved lozenge, of radius 6000km or so. Or if the Bent Light
Rays (a weird Lunar idea if ever I heard one) act to reproduce such an
effect, even over long distances.
Alex.
---------------------
From: Private_User@wdni.com (Carlson, Pam)
Subject: haploid/diploid
Message-ID: <2EB96AC3@emssmtp.msm.weyer.com>
Date: 3 Nov 94 23:00:00 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6849
Oops. In my previous POPULATION post, please change "haploid" population to
"diploid" population. (Diploid refers to animals with two stands of DNA -
like humans). I work with haploid crustaceans, so it was subliminally
influenced...
---------------------
From: alex@dcs.gla.ac.uk (Alex Ferguson)
Subject: Aldryami: floor wax or dessert topping?
Message-ID: <9411032304.AA06847@hawaii.dcs.gla.ac.uk>
Date: 3 Nov 94 23:04:47 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6850
Joerg and Sandy set about one another with sarcasm and extreme violence:
> >The difference between a raiding band of elves and one of tusk
> >riders (represented with 5 counters in DP) escapes me.
> The Tusk Riders openly boast of their prowess as mercenaries,
> are organized into mobile bands, and actively seek hire. They try as
> hard as they can to be little square counters on the DP map. Elves
> are completely and utterly different.
As appealing as the image of Tusk Riders furrowing their low brows, and
thinking thoughts of rectilinear flatness is, I reckon the numbers on
the counters are somewhat more important. I think one could usefully
model an alryami force (at least partly) in terms of units, as long as
one correctly reflects that: they will be vastly more effective both
physically and magically in forests than outside; and that they will
typically be a very dispersed force, so the melee and physical magic
rules would have to be tinkered with to model the difficulty of
eliminating them by melee or strat-bombing.
Portraying an alryami "unit" purely by terrain effects would be boring
for the most important thing, and also doesn't really reflect the finite
but highly mobile forces of the defender.
Alex.
---------------------
From: ddunham@radiomail.net (David Dunham)
Subject: Shamans; Ralian Ernalda
Message-ID: <199411040027.AA28393@radiomail.net>
Date: 4 Nov 94 00:27:26 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6851
I wonder if a large part of Genertela's fabled lack of agricultural
productivity stems from its seasonal calendar? Pennsylvania (to pick a
random example) has 167 days between killing frosts, or about 24 weeks. I
haven't seen comparable data for anywhere in Glorantha, but from the Prax
temperature chart from River of Cradles, it's obvious that all of Dark and
Storm season are unsuitable for growing plants. That leaves at MOST 3
seasons or a total of 24 weeks, but that assumes there are never frosts in
early Sea or late Earth season. Glorantha loses for having Storm Season,
the only season which isn't said (in Cults of Prax) to have a comparable
Earthly eason.
David Cordes gives a detailed description of how shamans work, which is
pretty close to how I run it. The big difference is that we always thought
that spirits could be released by the fetch into the mundane plane.
(Thinking about it after your essay, it might take a casting [by the
shaman, not the fetch] of Visibility, which could be done on the spirit
while captured by the fetch.)
>If a shaman wants to be immediately effective in dealing with the
>material plane he will have to be a walking storehouse of bound spirits.
This was our conclusion. The shaman I created for a scenario has 8 bound
spirits (plus a couple in his fetch, since allowed them to be released
directly).
>The logic for having a fetch cast a visability on itself would allow the
>fetch and the shaman to interact together on the material plane.
No, that's logic for why you WANT fetches to be able to independently cast
spells while the shaman is corporate; I want to know what passage in the
rules logically implies that they can.
Jonas Schiott said of Orlanth
>A lot of people even seem intent on revising the whole pantheon - for
>instance we learn in Codex #2 that Ernalda isn't worshipped in Fronela, and
>David D. doesn't want her in Ralios, so obviously she's just some minor
>Manirian godling :->.
Ernalda is indeed present in East Ralios, but not nearly as important as
Orlanth's main wife, Ralia. Ralia, in her Ga-Ralia aspect, is the primary
earth goddess, but Ernalda is still the typical access to the Six Earths.
And Ernalda is probably Urox's wife in some Ralian myths. Ernalda is too
important not to be present in Ralios, but she's different in Ralios.
---------------------
From: RobMH@aol.com
Subject: The Lunar Future
Message-ID: <941104024116677798@aol.com>
Date: 3 Nov 94 21:51:46 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6852
I like Michael Hitchens' statement that the 'Lunars Win' future may turn out
just as awful as King of Sartars' future. This certainly would highlight the
importance of Compromise.
Of course I'd prefer an interesting and vibrant Gloranthan future, one that
was interesting to game in.
Soon I'll post my concept of the end of the Hero Wars and see if anybody else
thinks it would be worth a game.
--Rob Heinsoo