Last Argrath, hopefully.

From: MSmylie_at_aol.com
Date: Tue, 18 Jun 1996 17:52:45 -0400


Hello all.

Ignoring for the moment the temptations of "The Red Goddess: part of the Compromise, yes or no?" ... John Brown, on the AatD vs. the Saga credibility issue, wrote:

>...Argrath's Saga seems to be more credible than just the one fragment
>called "Argrath and the Devil". Argrath's Saga is very long and many of the
>facts are given footnotes and are proabably much more easily checked out for
>accuracy than that fragment. The enitire credibility of Argrath's Saga is at
>risk if the author (who went to great pains to document his facts) left out
>something as important as Argrath and the Devil killing all the gods.

Hmm; aside from the general question of exactly how one would go about checking the "accuracy" of a (fictional) centuries-old document, aside from comparing it to a bunch of other (fictional) centuries-old documents (none of which can therefore be seen as being more accurate than the other, though I suppose a hiearchy of veracity could be constructed) .... I would want to point out that the "Annotated Argrath's Saga" is itself the compilation of several seperate texts; in some places, the collector (Doranda) apparently "reconciled" the differences between the texts (the imposition, then, of a subjective interpretation on "original" texts we no longer have access to, and given the apparent lack of literacy in the Orlanthi world for a long time, one could presumably question the veracity of any oral tradition passed on during that period) and in other places let entirely contradictory statements lie side by side (forcing us, then, to decide which contradictory "fact" is the right one). It is perfectly possible that neither Doranda nor GS had access to complete versions of the various Sagas, or recognized that "AatD" was indeed a part of the Saga itself -- after all, Jalk's Book (with the AatD fragment) was taken down some 100 years or so earlier than the main Saga versions that are used to create the Zin version, so it does appear to predate them.

As Nick seems to point out in reassuring Hal Bowman, however, this _is_ arguably a relatively minor issue, at least in terms of most HeroWars campaigns (however many there actually are; I seem to recall someone noting the surprising scarcity of campaigns with a "Hero Wars" emphasis); the most useful part of KoS appears to be the _at_1640 "Composite History of Dragon Pass", up to maybe the Sacred Kings list. The further along in Argrath's career you get, the sketchier the info is (which only makes sense; you have to leave some room for player input, presumably, otherwise there's not much point in the game IMO). The only parts of KoS which need be considered "credible" are the parts which you feel contribute to MGF, after all.

Nick also noted, on some speculations I made about Arkat/Nysalor and Argrath/the Devil:

> ...I think there's something to be said for both these viewpoints. However,
I don't
>think either of them is the "Whole Truth".

Mm, agreed (and I'm still internally debating them, anyway). Indeed, I think it would be possible to say that a Gloranthan "truth", if such a thing even exists, is only the truth until someone's next big HeroQuest (at which point it risks becoming a "was-true" truth). I don't think the "truth" of Arkat would be settled until after the last Arkat is left standing, and even then that's only the truth of Arkat for that moment of Gloranthan reality.

Just some thoughts.
Mark


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