From: owner-runequest-rules@lists.imagiconline.com (RuneQuest Rules Digest) To: runequest-rules-digest@lists.imagiconline.com Subject: RuneQuest Rules Digest V3 #3 Reply-To: runequest-rules@lists.imagiconline.com Sender: owner-runequest-rules@lists.imagiconline.com Errors-To: owner-runequest-rules@lists.imagiconline.com Precedence: bulk RuneQuest Rules Digest Thursday, January 6 2000 Volume 03 : Number 003 RuneQuest is a trademark of Hasbro/Avalon Hill Games. All Rights Reserved. TABLE OF CONTENTS Re: [RQ-RULES] Christianity in RQ [RQ-RULES] Re: Christianity in RQ Re: [RQ-RULES] Hero Wars??? Re: [RQ-RULES] Re: Christianity in RQ Re: [RQ-RULES] Hero Wars??? [RQ-RULES] Re: RuneQuest Rules Digest V3 #2 [RQ-RULES] Re: RuneQuest Rules Digest V3 #2 RE: [RQ-RULES] Re: RuneQuest Rules Digest V3 #2 Re: [RQ-RULES] Christianity in RQ [RQ-RULES] Re: Christianity in RQ RE: [RQ-RULES] Re: RuneQuest Rules Digest V3 #2 [RQ-RULES] Divine Magic & the gods RULES OF THE ROAD 1. Do not include large sections of a message in your reply. Especially not to add "Yeah, I agree" or "No, I disagree." Or be excoriated. If someone writes something good and you want to say "good show" please do. But don't include the whole message you praise. 2. Use an appropriate Subject line. 3. Learn the art of paraphrasing: Don't just quote and comment on a point-by-point basis. 4. No anonymous posting, please. Don't say something unless you're ready to stand by it. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 5 Jan 2000 11:30:28 -0500 (EST) From: simon_hibbs@lycosmail.com Subject: Re: [RQ-RULES] Christianity in RQ > Hmm, what game are you talking about? My RQ3 deluxe edition has maybe >10% religious content, with the majority of that in the Magic book under >Divine Magic. The Glorantha book doesn't count, as it is an OPTIONAL >setting for RQ. I'm talking about the game Michael Cule described in the post which started off this discussion of christianity in gaming, and RQ in particular. Simon Hibbs *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe runequest-rules' as the body of the message. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 5 Jan 2000 11:38:24 -0500 (EST) From: simon_hibbs@lycosmail.com Subject: [RQ-RULES] Re: Christianity in RQ > I find that one of the frustrating things about >Glorantha is that I don't actually know what the Big Secrets are and so >I can't actually run the universe in a consistent way. It's simple realy. The fundamental truths of Mysticism, Materialism, Animism and Theism in Glorantha are exactly the same as the fudamental truths of Mysticism, Materialism, Animism and Theism in the real world. Otherwise the Gloranthan versions wouldn't realy be Mysticism, or Animism, or Materialism, etc but fake parodies of the same. Real world religions such as Christianity, Islam, Judeism, Hinduism, Budhism, etc all agree that the true nature of god/the divine is beyond mortal comprehension. So, of course, it's the same in Glorantha. Unfortunately, you and I are mortals. In my opinion, a book on real world theology will tell you far more about Gloranthan theology than anything Greg Stafford has ever written. Simon Hibbs *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe runequest-rules' as the body of the message. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 05 Jan 2000 17:22:34 -0500 From: Tal Meta Subject: Re: [RQ-RULES] Hero Wars??? DCFitch1 wrote: > > Crom, Mitra, and Ishtar! Another delay?!? By the Gods, if we didn't love > you so much, Greg Stafford, we would move out of Glorantha and into a more > accessible world, like the Forgotten Realms! Sheesh. All the work I've done to make Greyhawk accessable to RQ campaigns... :) - -- talmeta@cybercomm.net - Heretic, Dilettante, & God-Machine ICQ - 12594453 AIM - talmeta Homepage - *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe runequest-rules' as the body of the message. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 5 Jan 2000 22:21:58 +0000 From: Michael Cule Subject: Re: [RQ-RULES] Re: Christianity in RQ In message <000105113824I9.13298@weba6.iname.net>, simon_hibbs@lycosmail.com writes >Unfortunately, you and I are mortals. Umm, are you telling me that I need to be a god to GM? Or are you saying that GS is a god? - -- Michael Cule *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe runequest-rules' as the body of the message. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 5 Jan 2000 23:46:34 -0800 From: "DCFitch1" Subject: Re: [RQ-RULES] Hero Wars??? Sorry, Aaron. I used the Forgotten Realms sarcastically....since I think it is pulpy. I always liked Greyhawk....do I wouldn't dare use it in vain! See ya. - -----Original Message----- From: Tal Meta To: runequest-rules@lists.imagiconline.com Date: Wednesday, January 05, 2000 2:30 PM Subject: Re: [RQ-RULES] Hero Wars??? >DCFitch1 wrote: >> >> Crom, Mitra, and Ishtar! Another delay?!? By the Gods, if we didn't love >> you so much, Greg Stafford, we would move out of Glorantha and into a more >> accessible world, like the Forgotten Realms! > >Sheesh. All the work I've done to make Greyhawk accessable to RQ >campaigns... :) > >-- >talmeta@cybercomm.net - Heretic, Dilettante, & God-Machine >ICQ - 12594453 >AIM - talmeta >Homepage - > >*************************************************************************** >To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com >with the line 'unsubscribe runequest-rules' as the body of the message. *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe runequest-rules' as the body of the message. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 5 Jan 2000 23:59:07 -0800 From: Brad Furst Subject: [RQ-RULES] Re: RuneQuest Rules Digest V3 #2 >Simon Hibbs posts an excellent argument, which ends thus >Roleplaying game systems model how things happen in the game world. They >do not >tell us _why_ things happen in the game world. You don't have to know >Newtonian >mechanics and gravitation to write rules for archery. Why do you need to know >whether the Son is of the same substance, or similar substance, as the Father >in order to write rules for christianity? Chaosium has published a game called _Credo_ which accurately simulates (although the authors [Nick Brooke and Chris Gidlow] think they have tongue in cheek, the lessons and interplay are very believeable) the process of refining and defining the Nicean Creed. Thus a gamer can experience Roman Catholic catechism by playing rather than studying. These same authors wrote the excellent Gloranthan LARP _How_the_West_Was_One_, which also portrays debate among monotheists. Brad Furst esoteric@teleport.com *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe runequest-rules' as the body of the message. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 06 Jan 2000 16:41:23 +0800 From: "Matthew Barron" Subject: [RQ-RULES] Re: RuneQuest Rules Digest V3 #2 I've been thinking about some stuff related to this topic of Christianity/monotheism etc. - -Disclaimer- This is not meant as a further contribution to the Christianity/monotheism debate. I've said all that I think I can constructively say on the subject and I think the debate's starting to spin its wheels a bit anyway. Question 1: Where does divine magic come from? Does it come direct a divine being/source or from a religion? Or both? I'm looking for opinions and game implications here not an absolute answer. Question 2: How involved do people read RQ divinities as being in the day to day lives of humanity? This is especially targetted at the issue how divine beings respond to the behaviour of their believers. Question 3: What's the deal with Illumination? This seems to really raise some major questions about the relationship between mortals and their divinities. some comments about question 3 - unless you're using some form of mysticism rules - I'm thinking especially of Nikk Effengham's excecllent ideas here - then the only real function of being Illuminated is to ignore cult restrictions. But a lot of those distinctions need not be affected by Illumination. For example - immunity from spirits of reprisal. So what. even if your deity can't send spirits of reprisal after you, he's got followers. In the case of deities like Orlanth etc., loads of followers. You go awol and Orlanth just hops on the line to all his priests in the area and anti chaos thanes are hunting you down as we speak. This argument goes double for anyone who wants to ride the line between Chaos and the rest of us. In a way back post on this digest someone told of an illuminated character who was both Vivamorti and Orlanthi. Clearly the rules allow this but Orlanth and his followers probably wouldn't. Now you might play it that way, the PC as a kind of doomed hero, trapped by his nature. that's OK but I really feel that the character's got short odds of surviving for any more than a couple of scenarios. Basically my questions are covering this area - why would a deity(s) who gives away something of their power to so many worshippers not get intimately involved in large aspects of their worshippers lives? Is this just a campaign flavour question or do the rules really indicate a more proactive set of divine beings - as I think they do? Opinions welcome - dogma unnecessary (but interesting nonetheless) Matt B. *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe runequest-rules' as the body of the message. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 6 Jan 2000 08:55:43 -0000 From: "Hibbs, Philip" Subject: RE: [RQ-RULES] Re: RuneQuest Rules Digest V3 #2 >Basically my questions are covering this area - why >would a deity(s) who gives away something of their >power to so many worshippers not get intimately >involved in large aspects of their worshippers lives? Why wouldn't a king get involved in his subjects' daily lives? If one of them was a foreign spy, surely the king would know! I know, that was facetious, but you are presuming that a deity *can* get involved in the daily lives of it's worshippers. Cosmic compromise, anyone? Philip Hibbs http://www.snark.freeserve.co.uk/ Opinions expressed may not even be my own, let alone those of any organisations, nations, species, or schools of thought to which I may be affiliated. *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe runequest-rules' as the body of the message. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 6 Jan 2000 11:04:26 -0500 (EST) From: simon_hibbs@lycosmail.com Subject: Re: [RQ-RULES] Christianity in RQ > Hmm, what game are you talking about? My RQ3 deluxe edition has maybe >10% religious content, with the majority of that in the Magic book under >Divine Magic. The Glorantha book doesn't count, as it is an OPTIONAL >setting for RQ. I'm talking about the game Michael Cule described in the post which started off this discussion of christianity in gaming, and RQ in particular. Simon Hibbs *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe runequest-rules' as the body of the message. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 6 Jan 2000 11:09:24 -0500 (EST) From: simon_hibbs@lycosmail.com Subject: [RQ-RULES] Re: Christianity in RQ > I find that one of the frustrating things about >Glorantha is that I don't actually know what the Big Secrets are and so >I can't actually run the universe in a consistent way. The fundamental truths of Mysticism, Materialism, Animism and Theism in Glorantha are exactly the same as the fudamental truths of Mysticism, Materialism, Animism and Theism in the real world. Otherwise the Gloranthan versions wouldn't realy be Mysticism, or Animism, or Materialism, etc but fake parodies of the same. Real world religions such as Christianity, Islam, Judeism, Hinduism, Budhism, etc all agree that the true nature of god/the divine is beyond mortal comprehension. So, of course, it's the same in Glorantha. Unfortunately, you and I are mortals. In my opinion, a book on real world theology will tell you far more about Gloranthan theology than anything Greg Stafford has ever written. Simon Hibbs *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe runequest-rules' as the body of the message. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 6 Jan 2000 09:15:44 -0700 From: "Rich Allen" Subject: RE: [RQ-RULES] Re: RuneQuest Rules Digest V3 #2 > Why wouldn't a king get involved in his subjects' daily lives? If one of > them was a foreign spy, surely the king would know! When a king provides one of his subjects with a power (an office/command/etc) that is used in the king's name, and that subject abuses or makes the king look bad through the use of the power, the king will surely revoke the power, at a minimum, and would most likely assess some kind of punishment as well. A diety would be able to do the same thing, in my opinion. This doesn't mean that the diety could not be fooled, not all dieties have to be omniscient or omnipotent after all. Rich *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe runequest-rules' as the body of the message. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 6 Jan 2000 14:35:01 -0500 From: "Bob Stancliff" Subject: [RQ-RULES] Divine Magic & the gods Much of this is opinion, so don't come down too hard if you happen to disagree. I will discuss my interpretation of Glorantha in RQ3 terms to address your questions... > Matt B. wrote: > Question 1: Where does divine magic come from? > From a divine being/source or from a religion? A religion is a devotion to a faith or observance. It is a structure that unites people with common views. A GW religion explains why magic works and how to get it, but it has no magical power in itself. All Divine Magic comes directly from a god. It can be aided by castor actions or have preconditions that allow it to be cast, but the deity provides the force or energy. One precondition is that the worshipper has to be tied to the god. This is represented in RQ by the POW sacrifice to become an Initiate. I believe that Steve Maurer's hero quest rules called this a Soul Link, and that is a good term. The soul of the worshipper is tied to the deity's on a near permanent basis and can usually only be broken by mutual agreement or excommunication. The Soul Link allows sacrifices of MP's and POW to reach the god and strengthen him/her. The god uses these gifts to maintain their place in the cosmos and to cast the spells the worshipper has sacrificed for. It is not clear whether the POW is used up when the god casts a spell for an initiate, but the initiate loses the link to it. A priest has the honor of being more closely tied to the god and not losing the link to spells when they are cast. This suggests that gods cast divine magic using MP's, but take the POW from initiates for their own use when the contract is fulfilled. The alternate (or possibly more official) explanation is that the POW from an initiate is used up because their tie to the god is not strong enough to survive the spell casting energy. When a god casts a spell they draw directly on the runic source that the spell is derived from. They shape the magic by their skill into the form of the requested spell, and pass it through the POW sacrifice back to the worshipper. Most deities also have a legion of follower spirits that are tied to the rune(s) of the god (or their allies). These are provided to worshippers for various uses including spirit magic spell teaching. This is not true animism because the lesser spirits are not revered or worshipped, they are only servants to the god. Shamans contact these same spirits, but do so from an animism viewpoint. Shamans are far less likely to contact a deity spirit since their personal risk is much greater. Generally, a god frowns on a worshipper having any spirit magic that is not given by that god's servants or the allies of that god. For a major pantheon, this would mean that most (or many) spirit spells can be gained through allied cults, but that several are either forbidden or unavailable. > Question 2: How involved do people read RQ divinities > as being in the day to day lives of humanity? This is > especially targeted at the issue of how divine beings > respond to the behaviour of their believers. When time began, the Compromise forced the gods to retreat to the godtime. This is a form of sub-dimension or spiritual analog to the physical world. It is outside time and not directly affected by time. The Compromise forbids the gods from entering the world, or to take direct actions, except through aid to worshippers. Because the gods are outside time and are worshipped across time, they have difficulty perceiving specific events without a frame of reference being provided for them. This is usually given by worshippers praying for their attention and/or casting many spells. Much of their knowledge of the physical world is through prayers and worship of followers. The gods have knowledge of their 'sphere of influence', but the detail of that knowledge depends on how intimately it impinges on their perception. Orlanth has a great deal of knowledge about winds and storms, less knowledge about creatures tied to wind, and a very modest knowledge of all things happening within winds. If he is asked, he may realize that someone is flying over the Rockwood Mountains, and if it is a worshipper, he might be able to name that person. > Question 3: What's the deal with Illumination? This > seems to really raise some major questions about > the relationship between mortals and their divinities. MY view is that Glorantha, or the first dragon (etc), manifested from Chaos and survived by being an embodiment of the principle of Law and that all of the other (good) runic forces supported the world's continued existence. All of the gods, cultures, and creatures of the world share some portion of this tie to Law. Deities and creatures sharing the powers of Chaos have similar ties to the essence of Chaos. As long as this tie exists, a person will trigger the opposite detection power (such as StormBull Detect Chaos), they are subject to cult restrictions and other laws (Soul Sight will detect apostasy), and breaking Geases will incur strong penalties. The first effect of Illumination is that this tie to Law or Chaos is broken and the person moves to a neutral position between the two. Since they are no longer tied to support or opposition of the essence of Law which maintains the world, the laws and restrictions of the world no longer sense that they are in or out of accord with those laws, so they no longer detect as Law or Chaos, they are no longer bound by Geases or cult restrictions, and their perception of the relation between Law and Chaos is no longer bi-polar (them vs. us). Law is no longer equated with Good and Chaos is no longer equated with Evil. It is now obvious that Good and Evil exist, or can exist, within both forces. All other links between a worshipper and their god remain, so all cult benefits remain, including spells and gifts. Unless the god's attention is drawn to an illuminated member and their wrong actions, the god will not realize that they are apostate. Note that this is not an automatic or certain process... in the First Age, Lokamyadon nearly redirected all worship of Orlanth to himself within the region of the Second Council (?) just before the Gabji Wars. The second effect of Illumination is that one Illuminate can, with time and effort, detect another Illuminate by analyzing or identifying the changes in their views from those of 'normal' people. Many Illuminates, if they don't just go crazy, try to hide these changes, or deny to themselves that they have even occurred. This is especially common in regions where Illumination is considered Evil or Chaotic. Bob Stancliff *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe runequest-rules' as the body of the message. ------------------------------ End of RuneQuest Rules Digest V3 #3 *********************************** *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe runequest-rules' as the body of the message. RuneQuest is a Trademark of Hasbro/Avalon Hill Games. With the exception of previously copyrighted material, unless specified otherwise all text in this digest is copyright by the author or authors, with rights granted to copy for personal use, to excerpt in reviews and replies, and to archive unchanged for electronic retrieval.