Elementals

From: Benedict Adamson <ben_at_cd.co.uk>
Date: Fri, 13 Jun 1997 13:22:32 +0100


Alex Ferguson <abf_at_interzone.ucc.ie> wrote ...
> ...I don't think
> elemental availability is a reliable bottleneck. Finding an elemental
> is probably fairly straightforward for a typical shaman, and a decent
> number of cults have suitable Summon spells; frex, the Lunars have the
> Young Elementals, while I'd bet on Heler coming up with one for any
> crazed Orlanthi wanting to pull such a stunt.
...
I've been thinking for sometime that Glorantha requires more variety in its `elementals', to better reflect the cult/divine differences. e.g. Storm Bull is the god of the desert dust storm, rather than of the wind per se, so I think he should provide dust storm elementals, rather than sylphs; Heler should provide cloud elementals and rain-storm elementals; river god undines must always move, whereas lake god undines never can, etc.

These compund beings (no longer elementals, since they combine aspects of several runes) would have appropriately compound effects, for example, as follows:

Dust Storm (Air, Earth, Disorder)---Storm Bull, Gargath can not be ridden, opaque, and the dust does abrasion damage to everything inside it.

Rain Storm (Air, Water, Fertility)---Heler opaque, aids fertility of earth it touches, can not be ridden or used to throw people around.

Lava (Fire, Earth)---Lodril
no crush damage, but heat damage instead, and more mobile than a gnome.

Cloud (Air, Illusion?)---Heler
opaque, otherwise like a sylph.

Quicksand (Earth, Water, Illusion)---?
attacks by drowning rather than crushing, difficult to spot when stationary, uses its strength to hinder escape.

Dune (Barren earth)---Maran Gor?
attacks by choking (`drowning') rather than crushing.

Geyser (Water, Fire)---?
attacks by scolding (heat damage), opaque, less intense but larger than an otherwise equivalent salamander.

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