Re: Blue Skies and Blank Lands

From: Nick Brooke <Nick_Brooke_at_compuserve.com>
Date: Sun, 21 Dec 1997 18:05:52 -0500



Peter Maranci:

The Gloranthan sky is blue by day. Read up on Lorion's invasion of the Sky Dome some day. Or ask the question, if you want an answer. But don't just treat other people's contributions with the contempt you wrongly assume they have for your own.



Tal Meta asks:
> If I chose to write a scenario based on a "Blank Land", would it
> be publishable? I have been under the impression that the 'Blank
> Lands' would be left 'blank' so that indivudual GM's could develop
> them for their own campaigns _without_ published scenarios contra-
> dicting them?

I believe the initial idea was that these were areas where Chaosium wouldn't publish any "official" material (or allow anyone else to do so). The original announcement (in Wyrms Footnotes #11, the Spring 1981 issue) said:

: Blank Lands are regions of Glorantha which will remain undeveloped
: by Chaosium Inc. They will be left open for referees who would like
: to have a local campaign set up in Glorantha, but who may be fear-
: ful of creating a region only to have it later contradicted by
: something which we publish.
:
: While Blank Lands will not be published by us, Chaosium Inc. still
: maintains ownership of them and prohibits publication of them by
: anyone for commercial use at any time. This does not prohibit you
: from distributing your own information about them for your own
: campaign, though we do warn that you should try to follow the
: regional continuity of your chosen setting. Details on each region
: will be presented regularly in Wyrms Footnotes [ho ho ho]*, begin-
: ning with this issue (see Gloranthan Geography: the Neliomi Sea).

Well, the key points there are easy to see. If you intend to submit something for "official" publication, don't set it in a Blank Land. If you intend to make money out of it, ditto. Probably you'd be wise to stress, if you do use a Blank Land, that it's only your version (and that anyone else's version is worth exactly as much). But as the publication scene nowadays is (for better or worse) *entirely* =

different to that of the early Eighties, it's easier to see how something could be published unofficially and not-for-profit. I guess the question is, why use a Blank Land at all, since there's so much we don't know about *published* Glorantha?

That original article continued, veering into the Kafkaesque:

: Some of the areas we are currently considering as Blank Lands
: include:

[NB: I include the entire list for humorous effect: read it and weep!]

: - The Fronelan elf nation of Deerwood
: - Two minor Fronelan river duchies
: - A riverford [this is my favourite, I must confess!]
: - an Arolanit city-state
: - a Ralios river manor
: - several medium ports on the southern coast of Genertela
: - several Lunar cities
: - Garsting, a hilly land full of barbarians
: - a horse nomad nation
: - some islands off the Pamaltelan coast
: - several Pamaltelan mountain regions and other areas
: - a Dwarf stronghold in the Nidan Mountains.
:
: Remember that we at Chaosium Inc. always urge you to develop your
: own campaign, world, and game as you see fit. We are presenting
: the world of Glorantha as a prime example of how an entire and
: diverse mythical, philosophical, psychological and natural eco-
: system could be presented in a game format. We are attempting to
: produce a coherent and useful world system for you to play in.
: Blank Lands are the entry points of *your* dreamland into the
: ancient archiscope and land texture of Glorantha.

Well, since that was published in 1981, we could reasonably suppose all other aspects of Glorantha (other than a coupla ports, a coupla cities, one horsetribe and "a riverford", plus small change) to have been comprehensively detailed by official publications, such that it's surely not worth your while attempting to develop *anything* for your own campaign unless it's in a Blank Land, for fear of imminent Chaosian contradiction. After all, team, there seems to be *so much* new gaming material in the pipeline... :-(

And, some Good News! The Blank Lands are retreating! No more Blank Cities, Ports, Duchies, or even River Fords. The current "official list" (per Genertela Book) is:

I guess part of the problem is that in order to define what you're making into a Blank Land, you have to say more about it than is in print about the neighbouring non-Blank lands. At which point the whole exercise becomes rather farcical.

I'd be prepared to lobby strongly for Fornoar (Seshnela, GB p.79) and Tarinwood (GB pp.74,83) to be added, on the grounds that they are classic "places where several maps join", which don't seem to have much of a role in history or myth, but which are inherently *interesting* (if you chose to make them so).

Up Archiscope!

::::

Nick
::::


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