I had written:
>> If you're Carmanian, then the locals see you as a Lunar and the
>> Lunars don't. Your fellow Carmanians may be friendly provided
>> they're not in a black mood.
Loren points out:
>Umm. Peter? The Carmanians *are* Lunars. Their state was the very
>model for the Lunar state.
Oops. I was overly succinct. I meant that mainstream Lunars from Dara Happa and the Provinces don't like the Carmanians very much. After all the Carmanians are still at Citizen-furriner stage whereas ex-storm barbarians of Sylila Province have progressed to full Satrapate status. Hell, even the renegade Arrolian territories were capable of promotion to full satrapate status as reports from the Seventh Conference of Malkionism indicated. But the Carmanians are still furriners.
>In any case, as to Humakt etc. I think it works like this. Humakt is
>a die-hard traditionalist's cult. Yanafal Tarnils is the modern
>version of the cult.
I like your idea of the distinction between Humakt and Yanafal merely seen in Carmania as mainly one of progressives and reactionaries. I would have thought there would be a continuum between the two parties but the Carmanian tradition of seeing everything in Black and White makes this a tad improbable. Rather than having two parties which sounds a bit modern for my tastes, I would make the house deciding what god their hazars should worship to further its goals. One House may decide that Trade is the best way to go yet encourage its hazars to worship Humakt for in the Fazzik's opinion, Humakt makes better caravan guards. Another house may favour Yanafal Tarnils for its war aims as they see bushwhacking caravans as the way ahead. Of course the main rule Humakt=War and Yanafal=Trade is still a good rule of the thumb for a house.
Andrew Joelson:
>Joerg says:
>> The farther north you come, the more you get the Lunar edict to accept
>> Tarkalor's version, because it makes the Orlanthi sun-worshipping
>> barbarians more friendly to the Empire. Until they worship Shargash or
>> another Pelorian light deity....
> This makes me curious; does the Lunar Pantheon include a sun or
>light diety? Or did they pass, as all those Dara Happan sun/light types
>were lolling about?
This is a result of GoG trying to classify all the world into Pantheons to make it simply for the GM to see which gods are worshipped in what places. This doesn't mean that the locals see it that way tho. If, say, I asserted in Kralorela that its religion is a combination of the Eastern and Yelm Pantheons, they (when they had figured out what I was saying) would probably cut me to pieces as they are quite proud of the fact that they are the only Remant of Yelm's Empire to Survive Unchanged into the Modern World.
When it comes to places like Dara Happa, I don't think anybody nowadays appreciates the artificial distinction between the Yelm pantheon and the Lunar Pantheon. The Red Moon is seen as a planet and a sun/light diety. The conservatives, IMO, merely desire a return to the days when the Sun was in charge and not the Moon (this has got potential to be a big bust-up within the Lunar Empire, tho). If you start asking about different Pantheons, they would think you were talking about Dara Happa versus Pent.
Only in the Storm worshipping provinces do the Red Moon Cults (Seven Mothers, Etyries and Yara Aranis) come to be seen as distinct entities from the Solar Cults. Elmal enjoys a cosy relationship with Orlanth and can't be trusted whereas Yelmalio is aloof and isolationist and wouldn't accept a mutually beneficial relationship unless the other guy took the passive position...
Brian Tickler:
>Shield: Taking Shield away from "non-combat" cults has the undesirable side
>effect of pushing followers of these cults into "character class" boxes. I
>have always thought that one of RQs strengths was that anyone could attempt
>to do anything they wanted. Now, to some degree, it's back to:
>"I am Biturian Varosh, Issaries; I own a pack mule and a staff" (apologies
>to Bugs Bunny & Elmer Fudd). Why should Lhankor Mhys and Chalana Arroys have
>to fall down and/or run away when a 1m Shade says "boo!"?
They still can get access to Shield by praying at an associated temple (most likely Orlanth which does provide shields). The thing is most gods are archetypes which people imitate to recieve better magical prowess from. Thus most Ivory Tower types rarely if ever go adventuring because Lhankor Mhy is not much of one. A Sage can still investigate the pits of Dorastor but he would have to supplement his major magic (locating and finding Old Documents of the Broken Council) with more prosaic magics from other sources (like praying to Mastakos for mobility magics, Humakt for War magics, or simply learn sorcery) to help him survive. Gods for the most part are not one shop-has-it-all types. Seven Mothers, Orlanth and Pamalt are the major exceptions to this rule; which of course which is why they are major cults and Lhankor Mhy et al. are more specialised.
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