Re: The Glorantha Digest V6 #505

From: Brian Tickler <tickler_at_netcom.com>
Date: Wed, 7 Apr 1999 13:49:20 -0700 (PDT)


> The existing material makes it very clear that Praxian society is
> divided into clans, so there's no way they could be 'kept out'. Detailing
> these clans is the sort of thing HW should be very good at from what I've
> seen.
>
> Forward the glorious Red Army!
> Trotsky

Nobody I know has ever used the term "clan" to reference Praxians...maybe it's in some of the "later" books, like Genertela, I don't recall, but if so, it seems a poor term to describe a nomadic group, given that the clans most commonly referred to are of the European variety.

> Date: Sat, 3 Apr 1999 02:18:34 +0100 (BST)
> From: Alex Ferguson <abf_at_yeats.ucc.ie>
> Subject: The once and future Glorantha.
>
> Brian Tickler:
> > I beg to disagree...the potential for areas like The Paps, The Dead
> > Place, The Block, etc. are boundless...
>
> I'd like to think that's there's enough material already in print to
> give people with an inordinate interest in doing so a pretty good shot
> at doing so compared to the Lunar Empire, or even to Sartar, Prax has
> been covered in a relatively high level of detail.

Since I already said that the area is one of the most highly detailed areas in any gameworld, I'm not sure you're following me on this one; I was simply trying to say that, in my opinion, further fleshing out already detailed areas would be preferable to expounding on new areas. Here are a two reasons off the top of my head:

  1. Shared game experiences (one of the reasons the RQ/Glorantha community remains as strong as it has to date) - there's a tremendous benefit in having most of a gaming community playing in a fairly well-defined, small area. This seems obvious to me, but for those who don't see that, you need look no farther than TSR/DnD to see the hodge-podge of crap that results when you have multiple conflicting game worlds, pantheons, etc. It's still possible to run a great DnD campaign, in my experience, but to do so the first step you have to take is to narrow down your focus to make things manageable. Once you do this, your ability to interact with other's campaigns is poor (to import/export characters or to just shoot the bull with another play group's members). RQ/Glorantha had already circumnavigated this issue (by accident or by design) by focussing on a relatively small geographic area peopled by well-defined cultures and cults. For general gaming and for the general gamer (i.e. non-advanced), therefore, I believe that Small Playing Area = Good, Monomyth = Good. I know tons of people disagree, but they're wrong ;)...
  2. Campaigns - many GMs who don't have a load of time on their hands just run their player groups through each scenario pack as it comes out (no, not me)...forcing campaigns to restart with local characters doesn't work that well, and packing up a party and moving them halfway across the world every 3 months on some flimsy premise doesn't work that well either...

> > Let's keep the clans out of Prax...it was annoying enough when they
> > suddenly appeared in Sartar :)...
>
> Perhaps I'm suffering an Error in Perception, but it would seem you're
> implying that a) Praxian society isn't based on clans; and that
> b) Orlanthi society being clan-based is what MOB might call a 'naff
> retcon'. Surely these suppositions are both clearly false, no?

I'm sure you understand very well that people who started playing Orlanthi and/or Praxians in the early 80's had no significant information about either being a clan-based society...certainly the campaigns of the time did nothing to portray them that way. None of the RQ2 publications that I'm aware of ever based a scenario around a clan-based issue or area. Call it what you will...I prefer the term "revisionist history" though ("Gregged" also works fine).

Thinking back on my original post, I hardly see what anyone's troubled about. An offhand comment that was clearly a joke? I realize that my posts are often direct and thought provoking ;), but surely not every little remark is worthy of touching off another potential flame-fest?

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