Yep, even without the Egi, there are other ways.
>He may be weak
Definately. He may even be disbelieved.
>Others may have powers he previously gave them
Yes.
>Others may have powers they nicked from him - heroquesting, etc.
Yes
>He may even have a previous history, although its not really his.
Or it might be his
>Nearly everyone can't tell whether its him or not.
Some can, some won't, some lie, some don't care, some want something better, some don't want an Emperor at all, some want to destroy everything, some want the Red Moon brought down etc etc.
>Apologies, Martin, if I've got something wrong.
Don't apologise, t'is brave fo you to follow all the posts and views.
>If this is right, then the Red Emperor - the real, singular one - could
>actually have been sidelined for years now.
This is a possible, extreme way of looking at it, but it would be amusing I suppose. Hence the belt buckle salesman in Rinliddi or the fish seller sabotaging Sheng etc. Yes, I think this is possible, if rare.
>He is, in fact, a sad, rather
>pathetic figure, wandering the outer edges of the Empire, trying to find
>anyone who'll believe him - "But I *AM* the Red Emperor" "Sure you are,
>I'm Jar-El, and this is Prince Argrath..."
Hehe, I had thought about this as a possibility and this is an implication I hoped might be open to some GMs.
>Meanwhile, the totally fake Red Emperor is closer to the model so beloved
>by many a grizzled old glorantha-phile.
This is also possible. I'm not saying it's true and I won't explicitly state it in the book, but something I might do in my own campaign perhaps.
>Alternatively, everyone claims to be the Red Emperor (altogether now, "No,
>I'm Spartacus") and if the wrong one gets in, but does a good job, the
>real one waits for him to pass on before taking over, for the good of the
>empire.
Many might claim it, but there can Be only One.
>Doubtless, the fake one's spirit is absorbed into the real one at
>this point.
Or destroyed.
>Seriously though, the problem I have is this all smacks too much of
>mono-mythic certainty.
Which is something that many, many people have protested the lack of in much of Gregs material. However, I disagree that it smacks of that. If I say there is only one Harrek the Berserk, noone would even notice. Is that monomythic certainty? No, the reason why this gets people annoyed, is simple. It is a change to some generall accepted POV, and naturally enough, this opens cans of worms.
>If no one can tell whether this guy is the real red emperor or not, why
specify he >is?
Because he is singular and a demigod. He is not a human and is reincarnating. He has a core spirit that has soul parts attached to it, but that spirit is him and it is singular. To differentiate the RE from mundane human rule, to show, that like the Goddess he is divine, I think it is a good thing to state his singularity. It is also a good thing IMO to show that his oneness is no guarantee of continuity of rule.
>Why not have a nice ambiguity over whether the propoganda machine (Red
>Emperor - one size fits all) or the Life of Moonson (if you win, well
obviously you >always were the Red Emperor).
That ambiguity can still exist, it has different slant. To the citizens of the Empire, the power politics of the throne is mostly hidden, as shown in the Empires lower level of intrigue - the Dart Competition.
>It ain't like its going to matter to most people's games. Even
>Martin has said the main reason is that "as a GM its nice to know."
And as players its nice to have certainty, to then watch it dissapear as they begin to realise that the Empire is a lot more complicated than they thought. Peeling the onion of the Empire.
>Actually, as a GM having published sources that aren't too specific is
>even nicer...
Sure, but loopholes are everywhere, if you look for them and I won't have space to go into a very in depth description of the Emperor, besides, the GM can turf what he doesn't like anyway.
Martin Laurie
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