RE: Horn Gate

From: Sandy Petersen <SPetersen_at_ensemblestudios.com>
Date: Thu, 9 Apr 1998 17:50:10 -0500


Robert McArthur
>Hmm, I don't see how Horn Gate, from my vision of it, is a landmark?
Sandy, could you give us a vision of
>how you see Horn Gate if, for example, you were a Llankhor Mhy pilgrim
arriving there for the first time?

        Well, actually I was referring to the mountain at Horn Gate, not the temple itself. The mountain stands pretty tall and marks an abrupt end to the ever-rising chain of hills that lead up to it.

        But .. the holy place itself is pretty cool too. I see it as a sort of gigantic gate or anteroom at the base of the mountain, with a large archway maybe 20 meters feet across and tall. At the top, clearly visible against the mountain , are two gigantic (real) horns around 100 feet long each, sprouting up from the roof. No one now knows what the horns came from. They are not the right shape for any of the currently-extant herd animals of Prax. Entering into the building, you can go into the side of the mountain, and there are dungeonesque chambers & rooms with Godtime stuff, refugees, underground dwellers, etc.

Sandy wrote re Eiritha:
> She is, of course, a herd animal (what did you expect?).

Richard Develyn replies
>A topless barbarian in a horned helmet (pic in Cults of Prax)?

        I always figured those horns were _hers_.

David Dunham
>Where are there elephants in Glorantha?
In Genertela, elephants live in Trowjang, Fethlon, and Teshnos. They are domesticated by the Teshnans and some Kralori. There is a rumor that a tiny fragment of an Elephant Rider tribe of Prax still persists (I once played in an excellent scenario in which the PCs were trying to help the last vestige of this tribe get their remaining "herd", which consisted of one single pregnant female elephant, to Vulture's Country, so the evil Lunars couldn't use it for their own purposes. It was a riot.)

        The Genertelan species of elephant rather resembles the earthly Indian elephant.

        Mammoths, which are close relatives to elephants, are known to exist in the Elder Wilds, Fronela, and northern Pent. I'm not sure if there's any in Ralios. Mammoths are tamed by a caveman tribe somewhere in Genertela.

Pamaltela has four distinct major types of proboscideans, and each type is divided into subspecies.

        Elephants: there are a variety of elephants in Pamaltela, ranging from the small coastal elephants of Fonrit and Laskal to large hairless mammoths of the interior. There are midget elephants living on islands off the coast of Laskal. Some mammoths probably live in Umathela.

        Gomphotheres: Four-tusked proboscideans -- two tusks are in the elongated lower jaw, and two in the upper jaw. All four are sharp, and project forwards. The trunks are much shorter than an elephant's, more like a tapir's trunk proportionately. Smallish ones live in the jungle, slightly larger ones live in Laskal, and all sizes live in the interior. I do not believe any gomphotheres live in Umathela.

        Deinotheres: These bizarre and dangerous proboscideans live in the jungles as well as the interior, but not in Umathela. Deinodonts lack upper-jaw tusks. Instead, the lower jaw protrudes forwards and downwards in a sharp quarter-circle arc. Extending straight down from the lower jaw are a pair of sharp dagger-like tusks. Deinodons are notoriously aggressive and most Doraddi regard Deinotheres as as dangerous as any of the big carnivores. The biggest ones are almost four meters at the shoulder

        Shovel-tuskers -- These resemble the extinct Ambelodon or Platybelodon -- elephantine water-dwellers, with large scooplike mouths. They are water-dwellers, preferring lakes, streams, swampls, etc. They obviously prosper in Umathela, with all the riverine action there.

Fonrit: obviously the number of elephants your army can boast is the main measure of how ready you are to go to war. Also the quality you have -- if you have all Imperial Mastodons, and your enemy only has midget shovel-tuskers, you have a big advantage.

Me
>magic is not exclusively a force for good. There is healing magic, but
also disease spirits. There is
>fertilizing magic, and there is a Goddess of Drought. There is the
handy Kill Rats spell (i.e., Disrupt), but
>there are also occasional rats with full human intelligence (try to
imagine how much that would suck).

Jeff Erwin
>Who's the bastard supporting these gods? Keep in mind humans spend time
worshipping helpful deities.

        Why does someone have to "support" them? The Gods don't depend for their existence on human worship. Humans worship the gods for _human_ purposes. If there is a Goddess of Drought you can bet her presence will have impact on the world! Ditto for the Mother of Disease, Goddess of Rape, God of Winter, Wild Hunter, Bad Man, etc., etc.

        Some of these gods _are_ worshiped by bad guys and this lets them take effect more obviously and presently. Broos worship Malia, trolls worship Valind, nomad raiders worship Storm Bull, god of blood lust, insane shamans hide out in the wilderness eating filth and filling their fetch with foul spirits ...

        One hungry wraith goes a long way to cancel out a lot of "helpful deity" magic.

Jeff Erwin
>Keep in mind that the trolls -liked- the Darkness.
Joerg Baumgartner
>Now, did they?

Yes, of course they did. The Darkness was far better for trolls than the world of Time since the Dawn. At the Dawn, they owned vast tracts of land. Now look at them -- driven to the hinterlands and fringe areas, cursed with trollkin, no more human slaves. The Dawn sucks.

>Then why did they participate in the Unity Battle?

        To kill Chaos, their enemy. Also to keep the world from being destroyed. The Unity Battle did not determine whether the Sun would come up again or not.

>Did they appreciate to be separated from Korasting by the fiery invader
to their Wonderhome?

        They hated the fiery invader -- that's why they came to the surface world where it was still dark, and where eventual troll victories managed to regain some of their power.

>Why do dark trolls call themselves the Hurt People?

        Because they were wounded by the sun when he came to hell. Certainly life was better in Wonderhome, but even the Darkness was better than the Dawn.

Jeff Erwin
>I guess this is sort a plea for magic fuzziness in the new system.

        Then you're going to _love_ the new system, from what I've seen.


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