Don't be put off by the frequent digest phenomenon about argueing endlessly about the 'proper' interpretation of any given thing that seems vaguely controversial (the more cryptic and less explained the better). Most of KOS is really very easy to understand, and quite useful. There is a lot of quite straightforward (if slightly suspect) history, and a lot of really useful stuff about Orlanthi culture.
If do get hold of KOS, I think the short 'events in my life', by Minaryth Blue, is supposed to be the most reliable as a timeline.
From 1619 to 1625 I think (working from unreliable memory of
unreliable sources)
1619 Lunars seige Whitewall, seige and take Karse. Seige of Whitewall is
under Jorkandros Blinder, under Tatius. They also conquer Heortland.
Richard the Tiger Hearted destroys the crown of Heaortland and goes into
hiding.
1620 seige of Whitewall continues.
1621 Cradle in Prax, Argrath leaves on it, meets Harrek.
1621-1624 Argrath travels with Harrek. They visit Umathela sometime in this
period (probably near the end). I don't think they ever visited Jolar, or
any of the interior of Pamaltela.
1625 Argrath returns, dragon eats Temple of Reaching Moon.
Harrek may well appear a bit after this date, or may have left Pamaltela the same time as Argrath.
I don't know if the Arbennans and the Kresh ever actually erupt into full hostilities. There is also the threat of whatever is eating the Kresh wagons to worry about. You could ask Sandy what happens in his game, but I don't think there is any thing said about how this conflict resolves.
>We don't have any "hard facts" on the Jolar/Kothar conflict: the best
>source for
>"chrome" in this period would be to read Tales #11, the Pamaltela Special, and
>especially John Hughes' evocative piece, "Aranjara Dreaming".
I'll recommend Tales #11, the Pamaltela Special, but not particulary John Hughes stuff. This is not to put down Johns work (I have some reservations about it, but they are not relevent here nor do I wish to share them publicly), but the Aranjara are very culturally different to the mainstream Doraddi (the Right Footpath in Johns work), and the Aranjara are more or less on the sidelines of the Jolar/Kresh conflict. The most important thing to understand about this conflict is the mainstream Doraddi culture, and how the Kresh vary from it (not all that much - they have almost all the same gods, and they were normal Doraddi until only recently), and the attitudes both of them have to war, conquest, etc. I also find the normal Doraddi pretty fascinating in their own right.
The interesting thing about the Kresh is where do they get all that wood? They need a LOT of wood, and there is very little in their normal range of operation. The answer lies in the goddess they secretly worship.
>For those not in the know, Greg Stafford is well aware that there is plenty of
>rubbish in the Conclusion to "King of Sartar" -- he says he wrote it that way
>deliberately.
I actually found this section irritating because it was so obviously wrong - it was very clear that Greg was just throwing out some red herrings (i.e combining the genealogies of two people that are obviously not the same person for Argrath, for example). His unreliable narrators have got far more devious since - Plentonius, by contrast, would simply have left out or made up things that didn't agree with his point of view (because it must have been an error or superstition if it didn't agree with his truth).
>It is because the Red Moon Goddes was born after Time began,
>and was not bound by the Compromise, that the Battle of Castle Blue
>was fought (isn't this also called the Battle of the Four Arrows of
>Light, and also the First Battle of Chaos?).
As Nick Effingham pointed out, Andrew is quite right about the Red Goddess becoming part of the Compromise at Castle Blue, though the Dara Happans (and presumably Lunars) don't really acknowledge the compromise. He is also wrong, as the Battle of Castle Blue, the Battle of the Four Arrows of Light, and also the First Battle of Chaos, are, however, three quite different battles. The first two were fought against the Carmanians, the last being the important one here, fought against Orlanthi and water powers primarily.
Cheers
David
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End of Glorantha Digest V2 #647
WWW material at http://hops.wharton.upenn.edu/~loren/rolegame.html
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