Tarkalor in the CoW, Red Lunars

From: Stephen Martin <ilium_at_juno.com>
Date: Sat, 08 Nov 1997 01:11:47 EST


To All:

Simon Bray mentions Tarkalor's experiences on the way to the City of Wonders. I don't think David Hall was still with us at the time.

What happened was that Tarkalor and us, his companions, journeyed to the City of Wonders. We took ship at Karse. A merman surfaced at one point, and one of the PCs bet him/her that he could win a race to the city. I think someone tried to speed up the ship, the merperson cheated (sent a whale to swamp the ship), whereupon the challenging PC took up his air magic and flew in on a really powerful hurricane. Almost got snagged by a water demon guarding the city, but got past and overshot the city (blowing down many of the buildings), landing in the water on the other side, where some local merfolk or fishers rescued him.

What was funny was that when we all finally went in to be presented to the Pharaoh, she told Tarkalor he would have to pay for all the damages! This was all his spare cash, plus pretty much all his net worth in the world, plus probably a loan of some kind from his uncle, the Prince. As we only had a day to collect it, he was not in a pretty mood. He was in an even worse mood when he went to pay it (and give his marker for the missing part, I'm sure), and found out that the buildings had repaired themselves, and the whole money thing had been a joke on the Pharaoh's part.

Not long after this the campaign fell away as Greg turned to writing King of Sartar.

I love Simon's description of the City Sixth of Water -- much better than the minimal description Greg gave us! The Bridge being actually made of Water was the coolest, reminded me in a small way of the talismans in the book The Rising of the Dark, which are made of actual water, fire, etc. at times.

Nick on the "Red" Lunars
>Erm. Assuming you mean "egregious" in the normal sense, and not
>as some kind of "Greg" pun which I might have missed, are you
>trying to say that modelling aspects of the Lunar Empire on
>aspects of Soviet Communism is somehow incorrect?
>
>If so, this would come as a surprise to many of us here at the
>Reaching Moon Megacorp, and to most attenders of Glorantha-Cons
>in recent years (with singalongs, seminars and freeforms aimed
>at exploring the Red Army, Red Empire, political officers, "New-
>Speak" New Pelorian, etc. etc. ad nauseam for some).

Nick, just because y'all have popularized this viewpoint, doesn't make it true. I agree with Mr. Tines that the Tales version of the Lunar Empire is not quite to my tastes. It certainly bears little resemblance to published, "official" sources, such as the History of the Lunar Empire and the Fortunate Succession. While some such elements might be present, all the sing-alongs in the world won't make the whole place like that.

>So? You have ten years good gaming, and can pose as a guru when
>your setting finally arrives near publication. Keep waffling on
>about your favourite corner of the world here on the Digest, and
>when Tales or Tradetalk or whoever are looking for an article on
>your Specialist Subject, they'll ask you first. Then everyone
>*else* out there can be "Tined".

With the amount of published RQ/Glorantha drivel out there, there is no shame in not being published. You're starting to sound offended and offensive again, I'm sure you're just testy from a cold or something. :)

Jeff Richards
>Just to give an example how you too can ignore the pundits of the digest
>- - my advice is to ignore Sandy on this one and embrace Elmal. Dump
>Yelmalio outside of Prax (where MOB's retentive Sun Domers are too good
>to get rid of)! Sartarites need there own Sun god, not some wanker elf
god.

Here! Here! Down with wanker elf gods!!!!! (Except Yelmalio, he's cool.)

Stephen Martin
ilium_at_juno.com

- -----------------------------------------------
The Book of Drastic Resolutions
drastic_at_juno.com

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