**just what are the gods exactly? Nonexistent? **Schizophrenic? Do they exist as identifiable entities **at all? Are they completely at the mercy of their worshippers?... **So is it actually possible to "make" a god?....Just **WHAT are the gods??
Whew. The great God-Learner questions. In twenty words or less? :-)
I think it's very important to distinguish between emic (internal) and etic (external, meta-gaming, Gods-Eye View) perspectives when discussing Gloranthan issues. As hinted above, very few if any of the later are ever published - those horrid God Learnerish cult writeups are the major exception.
The emic view is the view of the RQ player or imaginative journeyer, the only 'real' view 'on the ground'. (Logical Fallacies AO1: Discus the contradictions in the previous sentence. 500 words, due thursday). Even if you have etic views, they cannot be expressed 'in game' and will be meaningless to your characters. Sure, it might make planning a campaign a little tricky if you plan to meet gods on a daily basis, but really what difference does it make? Trust your own views on the gods and run with them!
There are four basic and incompatible views of ultimate forces in glorantha, and these are well detailed in the basic sources.
A polytheistic Gloranthan
might have many views on the nature of the gods, dependent on culture,
history, cult and personality. Among the possibilities
are:
=* real 'people' as portrayed in the myths.
=* impersonal or unknowable forces portrayed as people.
=* human ancestors made powerful by their deeds
(apotheosis).
=* personifications of a culture ( a culture-wide wyter).
=* personification of elemental forces (patterns on the
godplane).
=* archetypes that live inside a human spirit and draw on
the powers of the godplane through human action.
=* the collective power of the past / tradition
revivified by mythic connection to the present.
=* don't know.
=* don't care.
=* a cult organised by the state or its equivalent to
draw people together and celebrate traditional
values and morals.
=* something that cannot be put into language.
=* something that must be experienced directly.
=* mere superstition.
Not all these are equally likely, and the people concerned wouldn't use the words I do, but for the sake of brevity... you get my idea. Now some of these are more likely than others, and I have my own personal pet theories based on two or three of the above, as will you. But just as they are unprovable to a Gloranthan 'on the ground' (unless they become an Arkat-level heroquester, and probably not even then) so they remain only probabilities to us. The question becomes what works for you, based on the hints that are available. (Sigh, just like life really. So much for roleplaying escapism). :-)
From the available hints, we know that Gods CAN be made,
and not necessarily deliberately as in the GodLearner
Experiments. Vinga for example. House Vinga was
originally an all-female group of First Age warrior
women who worshipped Orlanth Adventurous. (Note the similarity
between 'Vinga' and 'Vingotling'. Through the centuries,
'Adventurous' became 'Adventuress'
and the Goddess Vinga came into being as an Orlanth subcult.
Facts such as these that slip out in conversation with Greg may help us construct our own models, but they're unlikely to appear as part of a RQ publication. (Look at the cult of Caladra & Aurelion (Different Worlds 15, TOTRM 7) for another example of theistic evolution in action - and a rare example of hints being given out. Maybe this is because the writeup is by Chuck Huber rather than Greg).
As useful as you, the gamesmaster want it to be. Divination is an area that the gm MUST take responsibility for. Most of your sample divination questions wouldn't occur in a campaign, because the players would have very firm life-long views on the nature of the gods concerned, and are (or should be) part of a culture and world view that accepts certain things as self-evident. You've mixed in meta-knowledge that doesn't exist 'on the ground'. It would be like asking your god, 'Is blue red?' A character asking such questions would be suspected of being a God Learner or an Illuminate. This cheats, but can be a very handy game device to deal with situations like these, because the players are in effect already 'cheating', engaging in a form of 'Mythic Munchkinism'. And as with any question, the nature of divination means you can be as vague or obscure as you want to be.
(A marvellous scene just flashed into my mind. An Illuminate seeking to illuminate her god by asking Nysalor riddles as Divinations!)
In my view, nothing relating to the nature of reality can be "proven" in Glorantha. Reality is something to be fought for.
My current view of heroquesting is that ANYTHING is possible, if sufficient personal and cultural resources are devoted to it. (For the cultural link, you'll have to wait for TOTRM #14). You could heroquest to make trees blue or to remove the word 'zerodize' from a language. (You don't remember 'zerodize'? It worked!) But making the change would change you as well, drastically, perhaps by making the inner reason you attempted such a quest no longer valid. In heroquest, outer transformation and change stems from inner transformation, an aspect that is often ignored or undervalued.
Different heroquesters might simultaneously demonstrate that Yelmalio and Elmal are the same AND different. But 95% of heroquesting is devoted to REINFORCING existing reality or introducing concensual change within cults and cultures. 'Wild' or 'Arkati'-style heroquesting is a definite minority, and it helps if you're the son of a god. Of course, as the Hero Wars erupt, this will change in a big way.
Things always change. The underlying mythic patterns are eternal, but their manifestation (as myths, cultural realities, gods (!?)) change all the time. See Questlines in TOTRM #11 for an expansion of this.
I believe that the greatest changes in the heroplane during the Hero Wars will occur through ordinary people's hopes and dreams rather than through high-level heroquesting.
Yes. TOTRM 7, the Heroquest Special, covers just about everything published on heroquesting. Its an essential reference.
No, I think quite the opposite. Greg's recent work in GRAY and Masks of the Goddess (the Lunar Book) presents a myth world very different from the Orlanthi-flavoured views we've seen in the past. Exploration of areas such as Pamaltela and the lands of the Invisible God have opened up new and very different myth-worlds. The monomyth is essentially a RQII construction, and has gone the same way as Campbell's model in the real world. Formalist / structuralist devices emphasise similarities rather than differences, and its in the differences where the interesting bits often lie.
'Ultimate' decisions about the nature of the 'Glorantha Myth' depend on what the world means to you, and how it interacts with your own world-view. Glorantha is designed to ask certain types of questions. Most of the meta-answers are yours. If you want to explore the nature of the gods, there are certainly plenty of hints and guidelines - conscious or not - with which to build a model. Maybe ultimate answers are there. Maybe not.
It's really up to you. It's your Glorantha. Its your own personal myth. As Vico said, 'Homo non intelligendo fit omnia' - it is in NOT understanding that humankind creates its world.
Cheers
John
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