The three questions to ask are:
How much do you want to preserve from each of the game systems you will be raiding? Don't keep to much baggage but don't through out the baby with the bathwater either.
What new features do you want this new system to reflect that the old systems couldn't?
How are you going to keep the loyalty of the current lovers of Glorantha?
On the first question: Is the Glory mechanic (or anything like it) really needed for a Gloranthan game? I'm not even persuaded it was needed for Pendragon.
Pendragon was written to use a very 'coarse' time-scale. You played one main adventure a year and got one chance to increase a year. RQ is on a much finer scale: it only takes a week to increase a skill by experience and sometimes less by training.
I would suggest that you want the new game to be on an intermediate scale between the two. I would suggest that the Gloranthan season be the standard interval between adventures and the standard period for considering how your character is doing in advancement in skills and stuff.
Pendragon is good at modelling warrior characters in a chivalric culture. It is a lot less good at other kinds of character. You are going to have to expand both the cultural and character models if the new game is going to work with the diverse types that RQ can reflect.
I would suggest not only a seasonal cycle for characters but also for their cultures and social units.
For each type of culture, write a description of what they typically do in each season. Write also a description of the hierachy of social units. Write also a mechanic for dealing with what happens to the social unit economically, militarly (sp?) and magically in each season.
Something like this:
An Orlanthi Kingdom is made up of
Tribes which are made up of Clans which are made up of Families.
The topmost level should check for its health once a year in Sacred Time, influenced by results from the Tribes for the year before. Good or bad results in turn influence sub units for the next year. ("Bad news, my lord. The priest of Orlanth had a heart attack during the ritual. I fear the omens for the coming year.")
Each of the sub levels should check for health in the appropriate way for the season. A good economic result in Earth Season would mean a good harvest. A bad military result in Storm Season would mean broo raids and the loss of milita to them. Some results would feed up the hierarchy of the culture to influence the roll at the end of the year.
Just some ideas.
AKA Theophilus Prince Archbishop of the Far Isles Motto Nulla Spes Sit in Resistando (Resistance is Uslesss) Ask me about the Far Isles Medieval Society: Better Living through Pan-Medieval Anachronisms.
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